What Is a Mand in ABA? A BCBA's Plain-English Guide

A mand is a request that gets you the thing you want. The kid wants juice, asks for juice, and gets juice. That last part is the key. The kid asked for the exact thing that shows up. In ABA we call that "specifying its own reinforcer." The whole reason the kid asked is the same reason the asking worked.

A mand is also pulled by a feeling inside the kid. If they are thirsty, asking for juice makes sense. If they just drank three cups, it does not. That inside feeling has a name. We call it a motivating operation, which is a fancy way of saying "what the kid wants right now."

This page walks through what a mand is, what it looks like, and why working BCBAs care so much about it. The examples come from a CEU I taught called "5 Days of Manding Mastery."

The short answer: a mand is a request#

A mand is the technical word for a request. The kid wants something, asks for it, and gets it. That is the whole loop.

The word "mand" comes from B.F. Skinner's book on verbal behavior. He picked it because it sits inside the words "command" and "demand." Both of those words are about asking for something and getting it. He used "mand" to cover all of those forms at once. A please, a point, a sign, a card, a tap on the shoulder. All of them can be mands.

What makes it a mand is not the shape of the words. It is the why. The kid asked because they wanted that thing. And the asking worked because that thing showed up. If both of those are true, you have a mand.

The four parts of a mand (Skinner's setup)#

Skinner broke a mand into four small parts. Knowing the parts helps you spot one in a real session.

1. The motivating operation (MO). This is a feeling inside the kid that makes a thing valuable right now. Thirst makes juice valuable. Being bored makes a tablet valuable. We sometimes call this an establishing operation, or EO, which is just the slice that turns the value up.
2. The asking behavior itself. The kid says "juice," signs JUICE, hands you a juice card, or points at the juice. The shape can change. The job stays the same.
3. The thing the kid gets. The juice shows up. It matches the asking.
4. The match between what was asked for and what was delivered. The kid asked for juice and got juice. Not water. Not a cracker. That match is the part that makes a mand a mand.

Here is how I explain it in the course:

you have a verbal operant that is the antecedent is a establishing operation, some internal deprivation or satiation event. Then the verbal operant occurs and it specifies its own reinforcer. That's the basic setup of a manned as we understand it based on Skinner's verbal behavior. From the talk — Matt Harrington

In normal words: the kid feels something, asks for the thing that fixes that feeling, and the thing shows up.

Why deprivation and satiation matter more than the words#

This is the piece most parents and new techs miss. The kid's inside state is doing more work than the word itself.

Deprivation just means "they have not had this thing for a while." Satiation just means "they have had a lot of it lately." If a kid has not had a snack in three hours, chips are valuable. If they just finished a whole bag, chips are boring.

When you run mand training, you need the kid to actually want the thing. If they do not want it, the asking will fall apart. Here is how I put it in the course:

you don't want to run man training for a bag of chips right after they've just had lunch and they had a bunch of bags of chips for free... There's not going to be an establishing operation for that kid, an internal state of that kid wanting those chips. From the talk — Matt Harrington

So before you start, think about what the kid has had today. What did they eat? What toys did they play with for free? What did they watch? If the answer is "a lot of the thing I planned to teach with," you need to pick something else. Or you wait.

This is also why good BCBAs change their teaching items across the day. The first hour of session might use juice. The next hour might use bubbles. Spread out the targets so the kid keeps wanting them.

What a mand looks like in real sessions (vocal, sign, picture)#

A mand is not stuck in one form. The same job can show up in many shapes. A kid who cannot talk yet can still mand. A kid who uses an iPad can still mand. A kid who hands you a picture can still mand.

Three shapes show up most often:

• Vocal mand. The kid says the word. "Juice." "Tablet please." "Open."
• Sign mand. The kid uses a hand sign. The juice sign is a "J" hand shape that taps the chin. The kid moves their hand. You hand over the juice.
• Picture mand. The kid hands you a card with a picture on it. You give them what is on the card.

Here is the picture version in action:

if I pick up a card and hand it over to somebody and that card has cracker on it, they're likely to give me a cracker. But if I pick up another card and it has water on it, they're likely to give me water. From the talk — Matt Harrington

The card is just the tool. The mand is what the kid is doing with it. They are saying "I want this," and the thing is showing up.

In some courses you will hear the term VB-MAPP, which is a checklist BCBAs use to track verbal skills. It helps you see if a kid is manding across many shapes or only one. We will not go deep on it here, but know that BCBAs use it to plan what to teach next.

Mand vs. echo: why a prompted "tablet please" might not count#

This is the part most definitional posts skip. And it is the part that decides if your teaching is actually working.

An echo is when a kid copies what someone just said. The tech says "tablet please," the kid says "tablet please," and the tech hands over the tablet. That looks like a mand. The kid said the right words. The tablet showed up.

But here is the question: did the kid ask for the tablet, or did they just copy the tech?

We have a term for the kid who actually asked. We call it a discriminated mand. That word "discriminated" just means the kid told the difference between what they want and what they do not want, and asked for the right one. They picked the word "tablet" because they wanted the tablet. Not because the tech said it first.

Here is the check I want techs to run in their head:

Was that a discriminated mand? Were they manding for tablet please or were they just echoing the last two words that the technician said? From the talk — Matt Harrington

If the only time the kid says "tablet please" is right after the tech says it, that is not a mand yet. That is an echo. A real mand should show up when no one is feeding the words. The kid sees the tablet on the shelf, walks over, and says "tablet please." That is the one we want.

Working BCBAs run this check all day. Before they mark a target as mastered, they pull the prompt and watch what the kid does on their own.

How BCBAs decide what to teach first#

When a new kid joins a program, the BCBA has to pick what to teach. There are a lot of options. Colors. Numbers. Letters. Tacts, which is the word for labeling things you see. Mands almost always come first. Here is why.

A mand gives the kid power. The kid wants something and gets it. That feels good. So the asking gets stronger. The kid asks again next time. And again. The more they ask, the more they get. The more they get, the more they ask. That loop is the whole point.

A tact does not work that way. A tact is when a kid labels something they see. The kid sees a dog and says "dog." The reward is usually a "yes!" or a sticker. That can feel nice, but it does not feed a hungry kid or hand over a toy. It does not fix the inside feeling.

So most programs teach mands first. The kid learns that words work. Words make stuff happen. Once that link is strong, tacts and other skills start to grow on top.

If you want to see this in action, I walk through the whole order in the full course. The first day covers the basics. The next days cover sign mands, picture mands, vocal mands, and how to fade the prompts.

Frequently asked questions#

Is pointing at something a mand?

Yes, if the kid wants the thing and you give it to them. A point counts as a mand the same way a word or a sign does. The shape does not matter. The job matters. The kid wanted the thing, asked for it with their finger, and got it. That is a mand.

Can a mand be a single sign or picture, or does it have to be spoken?

It can be any of those. A mand is about the job, not the shape. A single sign for "more" is a mand if the kid wants more and gets more. A picture card for cracker is a mand if the kid wants the cracker and gets it. Even a tap on your arm can be a mand if you both know what it means.

Why do BCBAs care so much about the difference between a mand and an echo?

Because the kid only learns to ask if the asking actually came from them. If the kid is just copying the tech, the kid has not learned the link between wanting and asking. Pull the prompt and check. If the asking still shows up when no one feeds the words, the kid has it. If not, you have more teaching to do.

Keep going#

You now know what a mand is, what it looks like, and why BCBAs teach it first. The next step is to see how it compares to tacts, how to pick a starting shape, and how to fade prompts.

The full course covers all of it with real session footage.