Revising Unworkable Rules: ACT, RFT, and Rule-Governed Behavior

Your client says, "I always make mistakes when I'm talking in a group." You write it down as a problem behavior. But it isn't a problem behavior. It's a rule. And rules that look like facts are the ones that quietly run your treatment plan into a wall. This page is about one clinical decision: when to stop fighting the rule and start rewriting it with the client, using Acceptance and Commitment Training (ACT) and Relational Frame Theory (RFT). The move looks small. You take the broccoli-burger conditional framing Dr. Tom Szabo walks through in his talk, and you use it as a template. "I will tolerate a hard thing if it gets me a thing I care about." That same template fits straight into BACB task list items G6 (use instructions and rules) and G10 (teach simple and conditional discriminations), which is how a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) keeps this billable and inside scope.

Why some rules keep your client stuck#

A rule is verbal behavior that tells a person how the world works and what to do about it. Most rules help. "Look both ways before you cross." "Wash your hands after you sneeze." Those rules save time because the client does not have to contact the consequence to learn from it. The problem is the rules that overshoot. "I always make mistakes." "Nobody listens to me." "I can't handle being uncomfortable." Those rules act like a description of the world, but they are really a wide instruction the client is following. The client stops trying. Or they try once, get a small bump of evidence the rule was right, and stop again. Your reinforcement schedule never gets to do its job because the client never makes enough contact with it.

This is the part that matters for your treatment plan. If you keep building contingencies on top of an unworkable rule, you are pushing against the rule, not changing it. Direct contingency management is still your meat and potatoes. Do that work first. But when results stall and the client can use verbal relations, the rule itself becomes the target.

How to spot an unworkable rule in session#

Listen for the time word. "Always." "Never." "Every time." Those are the relational cues that pull the rule out of any specific context and make it universal. A universal rule cannot be tested, so it cannot be disproved by experience. That is what makes it sticky.

Then check the body. Szabo points to the gap between what a client says and what they show. If the words say one thing and the arms, the eyes, or the voice say another, you are looking at a rule that is doing more work than the client is telling you about.

also look for reads, look for body language. Yeah, I feel just fine but what are you doing with your arms? Oh, I'm just, okay, I'm angry. You see, like you should be able to not just listen for what people say but also look at how they're saying it. From the talk — Dr. Tom Szabo

You do not need a fancy assessment for this. You need to write down the exact sentence the client used, mark the time word, and note one thing their body was doing while they said it. That is your data point.

The "I always make mistakes" rewrite, step by step#

Here is the worked example from the talk, broken into the parts you can actually use in a session.

Step one. Pull the rule apart. The client says, "I always make mistakes when I'm talking in a group." There are two things being related. The client. And making mistakes. Szabo calls these the relata, which is just a word for the two things in the rule.

Step two. Find the relational cue. The cue is the word "always." It pulls the rule out of time and into every moment forever. That is what makes it heavy.

I always make mistakes when I'm talking in a group. Well, what are the things being related? The two things are I and making mistakes. These we call relata. It's a fancy word for things being related. What about how are these two things being related? They're being related in terms of time. From the talk — Dr. Tom Szabo

Step three. Find the functional cue. That is the context the client added on the back of the sentence. "When I'm talking in a group." That is good news. It means the rule already has a context built into it, even if the client cannot see it yet. Your job is to make the context visible.

Step four. Add exceptions the client already lives. Not exceptions you invent. Exceptions they can name. Walking the dog. Talking to a best friend. Ordering coffee. You are not arguing. You are asking.

Step five. Bridge the exception back to the hard context. The client practices the target behavior in the easy context first, then closer and closer to the hard one.

recognize that I always make mistakes when I'm talking in a group, but not when I'm talking to my best friend. And not when I'm walking my dog. And I practice talking in a group when I'm walking my dog. And I practice talking in a group when I'm with my best friend. From the talk — Dr. Tom Szabo

You just turned a universal rule into a graded skill program. That is BACB G10 work. Simple and conditional discrimination training, written in plain language.

Using context cues to add exceptions without arguing#

The mistake new clinicians make here is debating the rule. The client says "I always make mistakes" and the clinician says "no you don't." Now the client has to defend the rule, which strengthens it.

Do not debate. Add context. The question is not "is the rule true." The question is "when is the rule true and when is it not." Every "when" you find is a context cue you can build on. Walking the dog. Talking with one friend. Ordering at a counter where the menu is short. These are not exceptions you have to prove. They are settings the client can already describe.

Then you build practice in those settings first. You move toward the hard setting in small steps. The rule does not get argued with. It gets surrounded.

The broccoli-in-the-burger move for tolerating hard tasks#

This is the other half of the work. Some treatment goals require the client to tolerate something they do not like. A non-preferred task. A wait. A sensation. A feeling. A loud room. You are not going to make the hard thing fun. You are going to attach it to something the client already wants.

Szabo's frame for this is conditional. "I will accept a small amount of the thing I do not like, if it sits inside a bigger thing I do like." A small amount of broccoli, chopped fine, inside a burger.

Would you be willing to have a little bit of your least favorite food if it was chopped up into really tiny pieces and put inside of your very favorite food? I'm a vegan, so this is a vegan burger. This is not a meat burger. At any rate, you know, broccoli inside of a hamburger? From the talk — Dr. Tom Szabo

In a behavior plan that looks like this. The hard thing is the broccoli. The valued outcome is the burger. The contingency contract names both, in the client's own words. Szabo's example in the talk is a boy who wants to play video games with his brother. The hard thing is sharing toys with a brother who does everything his way. The burger is time with family, which the boy named as his "what for." The plan says: I will play video games with my brother for half an hour, three days a week, after we both finish homework. The hard part is named. The payoff is named. The rule the boy now follows is conditional, not universal.

This is where BACB G6 and G10 lock in. You are using a rule on purpose, and you are teaching the client to make a conditional discrimination instead of a global one.

What about G6? What about G6? Use instructions and rules. Well, rule-constricted behavior is a targeted act. What we want people to do is to identify their unworkable rules and rearticulate them in ways that are more helpful. What about G10? Teach simple and conditional discriminations. From the talk — Dr. Tom Szabo

When rule revision is the wrong intervention#

Three checks before you reach for this.

One. Direct contingency management has to come first. If you have not run a clean function-based plan and given it a fair shot, you do not know yet whether the rule is the barrier. The rule might be carrying the blame for a reinforcer you never delivered.

Two. The client has to be able to relate things verbally. Rule revision uses arbitrarily applicable relational responding. If your client cannot do that yet, you stay with direct contingency work and skill building. This is not a reach goal. It is a prerequisite.

Three. The rule has to actually be in the way. Sometimes a client says a heavy sentence and it is not driving the behavior. It is just a thing they say. Use Szabo's "tells and reads" check. If the body matches the words, and you see the behavior pull back when the rule shows up, you have a target. If not, leave it alone.

If those three checks pass, then rule revision is on the table. Write the rewritten rule into the plan as your verbal SD. Track whether the client states the new rule out loud and whether the rate of the target behavior climbs after they do.

Frequently asked questions#

What if my client insists their rule is just true? Do not argue the rule. Ask for one setting where it is not true. Most clients can find one. That single exception is a context cue you can build practice in. The rule does not have to be proven false. It only has to be shown to live in some contexts and not others.

Is this the same as cognitive restructuring? No. Cognitive restructuring asks the client to evaluate the truth of a thought. Rule revision in ACT and ABA asks whether the rule is workable in this context, given what the client says they care about. You are not testing belief. You are testing function. That difference keeps it inside an ABA scope.

How do I track rule-following as a measurable behavior? Track three things. One, whether the client states the rewritten rule out loud during the session, yes or no. Two, the rate or duration of the target behavior in the contexts the new rule names. Three, generalization probes in the harder context the original rule used to block. The rule is the SD. The target behavior is the dependent variable. The data sheet does not need to mention ACT.

Try this in your next session#

Pick one client. Listen for a sentence with "always" or "never" or "every time" in it. Write it down word for word. Pull out the relata and the time cue. Ask the client for one setting where the rule does not hold. Then write a rewritten, conditional version into the plan as a verbal SD, and pair it with a payoff the client named themselves. That is the whole move. If you want the longer version, with the decision tree for when to use it and the contingency contract template, watch the full CEU.