Effects of Presession Pairing on Preference for Therapeutic Conditions and Challenging Behavior.

The current study examined child preference for presession therapeutic conditions. A 4-year-old female diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) was exposed to three conditions in a concurrent-chains arrangement: presession pairing (PSP) prior to the onset of discrete-trial instruction (DTI), free play (FP) prior to DTI, or immediate onset of DTI. Initial link selections in the concurrent-chains arrangement suggested a relative preference for the PSP condition across multiple therapists.

A review of research on direct-care staff data collection regarding the severity and function of challenging behavior in individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

In working with individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDDs), it is direct care staff who are often required to collect data on individuals' behavior which is used as the basis for implementation of empirically based approaches for intervention and treatment. Due to limited resources, indirect and descriptive measures of challenging behaviors are employed to analyze the function of individuals' behaviors in place of the preferred method of multimodal assessment, which includes experimental functional analysis. To ensure the most effective services and support to individuals with IDDs, accurate and consistent data collection is critical.