Observing staff-resident interactions: what staff do, what residents receive

Observations of direct-care staff behavior were made for 20 consecutive days at various locations in a large state-operated residential facility serving clients with mental retardation. Results indicated that the clients' functioning level, the presence of professional staff, the location of the observation, and the resident-staff ratio significantly affected the activities of direct-care staff as well as the kind of care an individual client received. Recommendations were made for increasing the frequency of desirable client-staff interactions.