Visit the Suggested Reading and Resources page for links to books, e-mail discussion lists, and web sites for further study. There are four basic types of punishment. Time out is the removal of the child from any positive stimuli. For example, if a child screams each time he is asked to work, using a time out might actually encourage that behavior rather than reduce it. Consequently, the next time he wants to escape from an undesirable situation, the child might well try screaming again, as it was very successful the last time.
Extinction is often successful at decreasing or even eliminating behaviors, but can be difficult.
Response cost is a punishment based upon a token economy system . Tokens are taken away from the individual for occurrences of an undesirable behavior. Consequently, I would, presumably, be less likely to repeat that behavior in the future. One must use caution when using response cost systems, however. In an educational setting, token economy systems can be very valuable tools, but they can be difficult to teach and to get the child to trust.