Training brain injury rehabilitation therapists to use generalized teaching and interaction skills

Persons sustaining a brain injury often exhibit aberrant response patterns and skill deficits that require remediation. To promote recovery, rehabilitation staff must be competent in use of therapeutic teaching and interaction skills. This study focused on teaching 13 direct-care rehabilitation therapists these skills in a multiple baseline design across skill dimensions. Performance-based approaches were used to promote acquisition of therapist skills, and the 'general case' strategy was used to enhance generalization. The general case approach involved use of multiple examples of teaching and interaction situations selected to sample the range of variability in the rehabilitation setting. Therapists were videotaped in simulations of various teaching and interaction situations before and after staff training. These observations were coded for correct use of teaching and interaction skills. Therapists demonstrated mean increases of approximately 30 percentage points in correct skill use after training. The present training format appears to provide an efficient strategy for training staff to promote rehabilitation efforts.