Troup County School System Psychological Services Department Functional Behavior Assessment The General Process

General Process for Conducting an FBA Phase 1: Identification and description of interfering behavior Phase 2: Measuring interfering behaviors Phase 3: Identifying contributing antecedent, individual and consequence variables

General Process for Conducting an FBA (continued) Phase 4: How the FBA contributes to developing a positive support plan Phase 5: Treatment validity --- Implementing and evaluating the effectiveness of the positive behavior support plan

Phase 1: Identification and description of interfering behavior Assessment methods –Interviews, record reviews, direct observations Clearly define each behavior –stranger test Team should agree on definitions Examples – Aggression = hitting, kicking, pinching other –Oppositional = not complying with teacher requests, not following classroom rules

Phase 2: Measuring interfering behaviors Assessment methods: –Direct observations & recording of interfering behaviors Guiding questions: –To what degree does the behavior interfere with the student’s academic and/or social functioning? –What is the relative intensity of the behavior? –How often does the behavior occur? Report “rate” data –Example: # occurrences per school day –Include length of observation per day

Phase 3: Identifying contributing antecedent, individual and consequence variables Identify and describe the variables that influence the onset of the interfering behavior (i.e., antecedents) Identify variables that reinforce the occurrence of interfering behavior (i.e., consequences) 3 categories of consequences –Positive Reinforcement –Negative Reinforcement –Automatic Reinforcement

Phase 4: How the FBA contributes to developing a positive support plan Identify antecedent variable => modify variable to reduce the occurrence of identified behavior Identify individual variables => select logically and socially valid replacement behaviors for student Identify consequence variables => determine how to avoid reinforcing the interfering behavior and how to reinforce the replacement behavior

Phase 5: Treatment validity --- Implementing and evaluating the effectiveness of the positive behavior support plan Ultimately, the positive behavior support plan should be implemented in order to determine the validity of the FBA!

Typical Errors Committed During FBA Recency error of perception –Generalization of variables present at the most recent presentation of the interfering behavior Primacy error of perception –Generalization of variables present at the first presentation of the interfering behavior Error of misplaced precision only –Occurs when only the frequency of interfering behaviors are recorded and contextual factors are ignored

Typical Errors Committed During FBA (continued) Error of inaccurate FBA –Incomplete or inadequate FBAs w/ faulty hypotheses Error of association any –Occurs when interviewees assume any present variables are related to the interfering behaviors

Reference Steege, M.W. & Watson, T.S. Best Practices in Functional Behavioral Assessment. Chapter 19 in Best Practices in School Psychology. Vol 2. NASP. Bethsaida, MD.