A functional analysis with a 13-year-old girl who had autism documented that her problem behavior was maintained by escape from instruction. Additional assessment revealed that certain types of requests and specific practitioners were associated with the highest frequency of problem behavior. In a subsequent intervention evaluation, response…

Background: Reliable measures of aggressive challenging behaviour are required if interventions aimed at reducing this behaviour among people with intellectual disability (ID) are to be formally evaluated. The present authors examined the reliability of the Modified Overt Aggression Scale (MOAS), an instrument not yet formally tested in those with…

Previous studies have identified peer provocation as a challenging class of situations for youth. The work presented here builds on previous methods of assessing peer provocation by (a) increasing the contextual detail of the vignettes; (b) developing a reliable, descriptive coding system of the range of youth responses to physical, verbal, and…

The interdisciplinary process is described through a series of case studies of seven persons with severe mental retardation in community group home residences. The clients exhibited a variety of maladaptive behaviors, including aggression, self injurious behavior, and tantrums. The studies describe an approach in which each client's behavior is…

Thirty students were formed into ten triads, each of which participated in a series of 48 games generated by the combination of eight power structures with six payoff levels. The game paradigm presented each player with the option of attacking or not attacking one of the other two players in this triad. The game procedure, apparatus and design are…

This 102-item annotated bibliography lists studies from 1981-1985 published in seven journals on developmental disabilities-related treatment research. Selected entries focus on decelerating problem behaviors in the following general categories: aggression, self-injurious behavior, disruptive/destructive behavior, stereotypic behavior,…

The article examines preventive measures (classroom rules, token or response-cost systems, contracts, cognitive behavioral techniques, and physical exercise programs) as well as consequential measures (time-out, verbal intervention, punishment, and physical restraint). The article further identifies (based on survey results) the types of…

Surveyed 50 elementary teachers who rated problem behaviors to indicate how much the behaviors disturbed and concerned them. The results suggested that teachers are more concerned about behaviors than disturbed by them. However, teachers were both disturbed and concerned about aggressive interaction with and between students. (Author/JAC)

Results indicated that the average child manifests a few of each type of deviant behavior, but rarely shows a large number of behaviors related to any one type of disorder. Deviant behavior was inversely associated with intelligence, but minimally affected by race, socioeconomic status and age. (Author)

Compared assaultive adolescents (N=17) and nonassaultive (N=12) adolescents on a measure of family structure, assessing family perceptions of the authority hierarchy and amount of closeness and distance between family members. Results demonstrated that the experimental group significantly more often perceived a reversal in the generational…

Argues that aggressive and violent behavior in children is the consequence of a mode of thinking which follows talion law. Psychotic children and those with personality disorders should be referred for psychiatric examination. Those with situational problems or neurotic disorders may be able to use advice to change behavior. (Author)

A firm physical restraint procedure (physically holding the child from behind until all verbal and physical aggressions had ceased for 30 seconds) was effective in significantly reducing the aggressive responses of a 6-year-old severely emotionally disturbed male in a self-contained special education class. (Author/CL)

Provides descriptive account of one common type of out-of-home placement for children, residential treatment center. Attempts to portray daily life in children's residential program by spending day with seven-year-old boy in residential treatment. Describes morning and school routine; afternoon routine of homework, chores, individual counseling,…