Positive behavior support, with its emphasis on teaching desired actions rather than punishing undesirable actions, can be a powerful tool for managing young people's behavior. In recent years, positive behavior support (PBS) strategies have been promoted as alternatives to traditional discipline for children and youth. School use of PBS has been…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the Fight-Free Schools violence prevention process had an effect on the frequency of aggressive acts of elementary school students. Participants included approximately 600 students ranging from Kindergarten to 5th grade in a suburban school in the Midwestern United States. Data were collected over…

The Screening for Understanding: Initial Line of Inquiry was designed to be used in conjunction with the child study team planning process for dealing with continuous problem behaviors prior to conducting a formal functional behavioral assessment. To conduct the initial line of inquiry a one-page reproducible screening matrix was used during child…

Proponents of the verbal behavior approach to instruction for individuals with autism have identified mand training as a starting point for early intervention. Mand training is a process whereby the learner is taught to request highly preferred items under conditions when those items are most valuable. A hypothesized benefit of this approach is…

Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) has many behavioral and cognitive features that would make it appear to be closely tied to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Obsessive-compulsive-related disorders (OCRDs) have been described in the literature as conditions that share a common phenomenology, neurobiology, and treatment response. The authors…

We evaluated interrater agreement across multiple respondents on anecdotal assessments and compared cases in which agreement was obtained with outcomes of functional analyses. Experiment 1 evaluated agreement among multiple respondents on the function of problem behavior for 27 individuals across 42 target behaviors using the Motivation Assessment…

Individuals with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) who display severe and challenging behaviour sometimes require centre-based intensive applied behaviour analysis (ABA) therapy to meet their health, safety and educational needs. Unfortunately, despite the need for centre-based treatment, there is a paucity of empirical research on building and…

Person-centered therapy (PCT) comes from the experiential and relationship-oriented therapy tradition. It is considered to be a third force in therapeutic engagement, along with the psychoanalytic and behavioral approaches. PCT is based on faith in and empowerment of human beings to be joyful, creative, self-fulfilled and willing and able to…

This study tested the effects of the direct behavioral consultation in situ training procedure for increasing Head Start teachers' praise during an after-school program. Participants included four Head Start teachers in one Head Start center. A multiple baseline design across teachers was employed to test the effects of in situ training on…

Early and intensive behavioral intervention has been shown to result in favorable outcomes for children with autism spectrum disorder. Procedures and practices based on and influenced by B. F. Skinner's Verbal Behavior (VB) have been increasingly integrated into EIBI curricula in recent years. In this article, I give an overview of some basic…

The purpose of the article is to propose a multidimensional scaling single-ideal point model as a method to evaluate changes in individuals' preferences under the explicit methodological framework of behavioral preference assessment. One example is used to illustrate the approach for a clear idea of what this approach can accomplish.

This generic qualitative study investigated the experiences of counselors who use cognitive behavioral therapy with middle school students who were bullied. Counselors can play a significant role in the life of an adolescent when tools are offered to help the adolescent recognize negative thought patterns and help them work towards attaining…

This study examined the effects of in-service training with performance feedback on preschool teachers' use of classroom preventive practices. Three practices designed to prevent challenging behavior were selected: transition preparations, rule reminders, and social-emotional teaching strategies. Following a brief training on each practice,…

This study evaluated the effects of a Tier II positive behavior interventions and supports (PBIS) intervention, Check-in/Check-out (CICO), on the off-task behavior of 4 students with behavioral challenges and special needs in a residential facility. In addition, the study examined the effects of additional mentor contact (i.e., mid-day check-up;…

Discursive practices enacted by educators in kindergarten create a blueprint for how the educational trajectories of students with disabilities get constructed. In this two-year ethnographic case study, I critically examine educators' relationships with students considered to present challenging behaviors in one classroom located in a…