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A comparison of outcomes from descriptive and functional analyses of problem behavior
Rachel H Thompson1, Brian A Iwata
1Department of Applied Behavioral Science, 1000 Sunnyside Ave., Room 4001, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA. rthomps@ku.edu
Abstract:
We compared results of descriptive and functional analyses of problem behavior for 12 participants whose descriptive data have been reported previously (Thompson & Iwata, 2001). Results indicated that in only 3 of the 12 cases was problem behavior maintained by the consequence observed most frequently during the descriptive analysis. Attention was the most common consequence for problem behavior during descriptive analyses for 8 of the 12 participants; however, maintenance of problem behavior by attention was evident for only 2 of these 8 participants.
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