Functional Behavioral Assessment -...

[Functional Behavioral Assessment] Nicolette Sabatino

Description of student:

CW is 13 years old and is diagnosed with emotional and behavioral disability. He is a

very energetic boy, and due to some of his personal history and upbringing, there is a lot of

need for physical comfort and support. CW struggles with focusing, however, when CW is

prompted multiple times or given a consequence, he can usually bring it back together very

quickly. CW has an extremely difficult time with understanding and demonstrating

personal boundaries, both physically and verbally. He demonstrates this behavior on a

daily basis with staff and peers. Sometimes CW can invade personal space very intensely

(both arms on other person, and face a couple inches away from the other person. Other

times, CW is not so intense and will come up and whisper in someone’s ear while they were

facing the other direction (almost as if he was trying to scare them).

Operational Definition:

During any form of school activity (academic, free time, lunch, specials; PE & Art)

when staff and peers are present, CW will demonstrate 0the act of invading personal space

by being closer than 1 arms length to the other person, by either physically touching

(having hands on shoulders, grabbing arm, touching hair, feet touching others under the

table, or knees being rubbed against staff or peer who he is standing by, or by

demonstrating sexual acts towards others (air humping the other person, whispering near

ear). The student will partake in this behavior for longer than 2 seconds, usually lasting

about 10-20 seconds, even when he is told to “take a minute”. CW will demonstrate good

use of personal space when he is more than one arms length apart from staff or peer, when

his hands, or feet do not touch anyone but himself, and when he is not partaking in indirect


sexual acts (not whispering dirty things into peers’ ears, or air humping staff when they are

turned the other direction.

A-B-C Summary:

During my observation, I got to watch the behavior occur between 6-7 times

throughout the 4 hours that I was in the classroom observing the student. The challenging

part for me is I noticed that a lot of the invading personal space behavior was either

happening to myself personally which made it difficult at times to record. I think that

originally we thought this behavior was one that although was happening on a consistent

basis, it was not necessarily multiple times a day, however after observing for 90 minutes

throughout the week, I started to notice that this behavior is a little bit more prevalent than


I had thought. Specifically some of the more inappropriate behaviors for invading personal

space such as air humping peers from the behind, grabbing on to staffs arms, or whispering

dirty songs or just plain old simple words into the ears of staff and peers from behind

seemed to be happening more often. The benefit from doing this A B C chart was that I was

able to see what is usually occurring before the behavior occurs. It helped me a lot in

determining the function of CW’s behavior. I am at school both in the morning and the

afternoon so I got to observe CW in many different settings and many different times, and

during unstructured free play, CW seemed to have the most “take a minute” requests for

trouble with keep personal space. It was pretty apparent that CW was engaging in invading

personal space to gain attention because that seemed to be the most consistent

consequence given after the behavior had occurred.

Summary Statement:

There is no identified distant setting event. When CW is participating in free play

with peers, he will begin to invade others personal space by either touching or grabbing

staff or students, have close proximity (closer than arms reach away), partake in sexual

acts towards peers such as air humping, or caressing or rubbing others to gain attention

from peers and staff and at times to escape activities or academic tasks.

FAI Summary: (See Appendix A for the Functional Assessment Interview)

I felt that I was very lucky because I got to interview multiple people in the school

setting that work with CW on a daily basis. I was also able to interview some of the staff

from the residential unit as well. At the school, I interviewed the special education teacher,

the school social worker, the two teacher assistants, and a member of the Peace Crisis


Team as well. At the residential unit, I was able to interview 2 of the staff on shift. I was

able to receive information from multiple people’s point of view. This was extremely

helpful, but at times, also made it very complicated because I had to pick and choose what

the important information would be. Everyone has observed the behavior, but when

determining the frequency, most of the people could not agree on a particular amount. That

was when my A-B-C chart and my FAO came in handy. Since there was only one particular

problem behavior “invading personal space” it made some of the questions on the

interview not really relevant. I also noticed that when I was interviewing staff, we could not

pinpoint any particular setting or time of day that would most likely initiate the problem

behavior. When conversing with staff, we could not really think of anything that would set

the student off. However, when the student is angry or set off, we noticed that he tends to

crowd up on people in anger, and talk very close to their face. I was really happy that I was

able to interview a bunch of people because it showed me that this problem behavior was a

real concern for the student and his progress in being able to attend a public school.

Personal space in a boundary issue, and it was great to see the help they were offering me

so that a program could be set in place to help find alternative behaviors.


FAO Summary:

There were some things that I noticed when I did an FAO on CW for two days. For

one, I noticed that when observing the student, the problem behavior had an increase in

frequency, particularly during recess times where the activities are less structured. The

behavior seemed to serve the function of gaining attention from peers. During structured

activities, the behavior did occur as well, however, the function seemed to be more for

either escaping a task, or obtaining a desired activity or object (piece of candy, or getting

the teacher’s attention so he can take an anger control break). I thought that a huge benefit

to doing the FAO was that I was able to actually identify when the behavior is mostly

occurring, and some common predictors. It seemed that the most common predictor was


free play and with peers, however, a difficult task and no attention also seemed to be big

factors in why the behavior is occurring.

Summary Statement:

There was no identified distant setting event. When CW is given an academic task

that may be difficult, or free play with peers, or when he would like to demand or request

something, he will invade personal space, by either touching or grabbing staff or students,

having close proximity (closer than arms reach away), whisper in staff or peers ears,

partake in sexual acts towards peers such as air humping, or caressing or rubbing others to

gain attention from staff and peers, to escape a difficult task, and/or to obtain a desired

activity or object.

Functional Analysis Manipulation:

Hypotheses:

1. When CW is given a difficult task, he will engage in invading personal space of

others, by grabbing or touching peers or staff, have close proximity (closer than one

arms length away), or come up to faces of others and make growling noises to gain

attention, or to escape the activity or task.

2. When CW is participating in free play or with peers, he will engage in invading

personal space of others by grabbing or touching peers or staff, having close

proximity (closer than ones arm length away), whisper right into peers or staff ear,

partake in sexual acts such as air humping, hugging, or caressing/rubbing others to

gain attention from peers and staff.


After conducting my A-B-C chart, I noticed that a distant setting event, was a task or

direction was given right before the immediate antecedent had occurred. I kept that in

mind while I was conducting my FAO. When I finished my FAO and looked at the data

collected, I realized that for some of the behavior, it was specifically linked to a difficult

task. For example, when told to do his Math, CW increased in the frequency of his invading

personal space behavior. He would grab staff’s shoulders and whisper song lyrics, or go up

to peers and distract them. With that in mind, I was thinking that maybe invading personal

space is a way for him to get sent to the blue chair, eventually leading to a time away

meaning escaping from the undesired or difficult task.

For the second hypothesis, I gained a lot of my information from the FAI and the

FAO. During the interview, it was a concern that the problem behavior was occurring when

mostly peers were around to help distract them from their work. As I was conducting the

FAO, I kept that in mind to see if his peers had an impact. Although I noticed the behavior

happen some times when the student was working individually mainly to gain an object of

desire (candy, or attention from staff), the student exhibited the behavior majority of the

time in a group setting when peers were around and during a less structured time such as

recess. A specific time when I noticed the behavior spike in frequency was during recess.

When discussing this behavior during the interview, we all seemed to think that CW loves

the attention, and that seems to be the main motivating drive behind his behavior whether

he wants some type of affection from staff because he lacked so much of it as a child, or to

look cool in front of his friends, attention seemed to be a big factor in all of my observations

(A-B-C, FAO) and interview.


1. For hypothesis one, I would consider setting up the environment in a way to

prevent the behavior from occurring. Have all the requests or desires met before

the academic task took place ( have candy on desk in the morning, have fresh

water in his water bottle, and have all the materials ready to go). To help with

the difficult tasks, have fewer problems for the day. Start small and continue

working up. The student seems to do better when working individually because

all attention is on the student, so maybe working in the back room, or separate

location might help him as well.

2. For hypothesis 2, I would consider completely ignoring all invading personal

space behavior. Specifically towards staff. When CW wants attention and comes

up to grab your shoulders or your arms, completely ignore him (providing zero

attention for invading personal space behavior). Then the next day provide him

with undivided attention to see if invading personal space is to gain attention of

the staff. If the student part takes in the problem behavior more because you are

constantly giving him attention during invading personal space behavior, then

we could conclude that the student engages in invading personal space to gain

attention.

Implementation and Results of FAM:

I did the FAM over a period of 4 days. Each day consisted of 4 sessions which lasted

up to an hour each. On Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, the sessions started at 11 and

ended at 3. On Tuesday the session started at 8 and ended at 12. First I had to talk with my

Cooperating Teacher and the two TAs in the classroom. We had to discuss that on Monday,


CW was going to be receiving attention for any form of invading personal space behavior

(whether he would be redirected, taken to time away, or reinforced with a hug or pat on

the back). For each session during Monday, the student was given constant attention for

invading personal space behavior. Event Recording was done to keep track of the number

of times the behavior was occurring in an hour. There was an increase in the invading

personal space behavior during this manipulation (6 different occurrences during the 4 one

hour sessions). On Tuesday staff was advised to provide no attention to the student when

he was engaging in invading personal space. It had to be made clear that if it the student

posed a great boundary threat to his peers, then some interaction would be needed. During

this, invading personal space behavior went down a little bit (4 different occurrences were

recorded in 4 one hour sessions, and 3 of the occurrences happened during the lunch

recess hour). On Wednesday, the constant attention manipulation was used again. This

showed an increase in invading personal space behavior (7 occurrences were recorded in 4

one hour sessions. 3 of the 7 occurrences happened during lunch recess hour). Thursday,

the manipulation went back to no attention and during that time, the invading personal

space behavior decreased (3 occurrences happened during the 4 one hour sessions). This

type of manipulation led to the conclusion that a pattern could be determined; the student

was engaging in invading personal space to gain attention from peers and staff.


1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 160

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Number of occrences of Invading Personal Space in 4 one hour sessions per day

Constant AttentionNo AttentionTotal # of occrences

Sessions

Num

ber o

f Occ

uren

ces p

er S

essio

n

Preference Hierarchy/ Assessment: (See Appendix B for MSWO Data Sheet)

When I was conducting my FAI with the teacher, she gave me a couple things that

CW would prefer in each particular category (food, activity, other). She did not know as

much as I would like so with that in mind, I interview CW himself to see what he had to say.

It was very helpful because it gave me an idea of what I was going to use for my preference

assessment. Although he gave me a list of many things, I was able to narrow it down to a

couple things I have heard CW talk about in the past. I noticed that basketball might have

been lower down on the list because it was an activity that was regularly available to him

when he takes anger control breaks. There was one assessment when food was high up on

his selection. I thought that this might have been because instead of doing the assessment

after lunch, we did it in the morning around 10:30, so he might have been more hungry

than normal. CW has talked a lot about music and playing instruments in the past. He use to


play the guitar when he was younger, and when he came to Cunningham Children’s Home,

he was not able to take his guitar with him. With that in mind, I think that getting to play

with the guitar was a very big deal to him because it had a sentimental value to it as well. I

noticed that the wrestling magazine was a high a selection pick at first, and then once the

student was able to look at it a couple of times, it started to get picked less and less because

it was old news. I think the jalapeño cheetos were not a high selection for CW because he

already on an instructional program where jalapeño cheetos was one of his rewards.

Data Collection Rational: See Appendix C for Data Collection Form

I chose to use Event Recording because it was not a behavior that occurs at a high

frequency. There is a clear distinction when the behavior is taking place, and when the

behavior is ending. The behavior is usually the same duration for each time it is exhibited.

For example, the student will usually grab the shoulders of staff for about 10-20 seconds.

He would usually stay in staff or peers face for about 10-20 seconds, or he will engage in

sexual acts such as air humping for about 10-20 seconds. If the student starts performing

the behavior less, then the rate of the behavior would decrease which would help give

evidence that a intervention is successful.

Baseline Data:

**Completed data forms are attached. See Appendix D for Baseline Data taken by both

myself, and one of the teacher assistants, Ms. P.


26-Nov 27-Nov 28-Nov 29-Nov 30-Nov0123456789

Total # of Daily Occurences of the Behavior of Invading Personal Space

Observation Dates

# of

tota

l dai

ly o

ccur

ence

s

IOA:

The IOA was gathered by comparing my data collection to another teacher assistant

in the classroom. The teacher assistant and I collected data during the afternoon when 2

other students were out so the classroom was over staffed. We watched from 11-3 which

includes 5 different subjects/activities. The teacher assistant was given a operational

definition of invading personal space. He was to keep track by tallying every time the

behavior occurred for that each hour using the Event Recording Data Sheet. I would be

doing the same thing. At the end I would look at Interval by Interval IOA to determine if the

teacher assistant and I were in agreement with what we both observed during the 4 hour

observation periods.

Results of IOA:

Interval By Interval IOA: 17/20 = .85 x 100 = 85% agreement


lll l ll l ll l 0 lll ll l lll l lll ll ll l ll ll lll l

lll l ll l l ll l lll ll l lll l lll ll ll l ll ll lll l

+ + + + - - - + + + + + + + + + + + + +

As you can see from the above table, I used interval by interval agreement to see the

inter-observer agreement. There were 3 intervals out the 20 where me and the other

observer did not agree on what we saw. One reason for this is that because during that

particular day, the teacher had to step out of the class to handle a consequence, leave only

one staff in the classroom so I was trying to observe, but help out as much as I could so that

the class did not go into total chaos. With that in mind,I think I might have missed a few

occurrences. I think that I would want to continue this data for another week to make sure

that my observational definition has nothing to do with the disagreement. If I notice that

there are more disagreements, then I would maybe consider changing my operational

definition, or train the observer a little bit better before having them begin recording.

However, I think that was not the case for this instance.

References: Annotated Reference List:

1. Higgins, J., Williams, R., & McLaughlin, T. F. (2001). The Effects of a Token Economy

Employing Instructional Consequences for a Third-Grade Student with

Learning Disabilities: A Data-based Case Study. Education And Treatment Of

Children, 24(1), 99-106.

2. Bani, M (2011): The use and frequency of verbal and non-verbal praise in

nurture groups, Emotional and Behavioral Difficulties, 16:1, 47-67


3. Lalli, J. S., Mace, F., (1991). Linking descriptive and experimental analyses in the

treatment of bizarre speech. Journal Of Applied Behavior Analysis, 24(3), 553-62.

4. Edwards, R. P., Marlow, A. G., Olmi, D. & Tingstrom, D. H. (1997). The effects of

classroom-based time-in/time-out on compliance rates in children with

speech/language disabilities. Child & Family Behavior Therapy, 19(2), 1-15.

In the first article, The effects of a token economy employing instructional consequences

for a third grade student with learning disabilities, the main purpose was to determine if the

use of a Token Economy system used as a reward would help decrease 3 problem

behaviors (Higgins. J., McLaughlin, T.F., Williams, R, 2011). Those problem behaviors were

getting out of seat, poor posture, and talking out. The token economy proved to be effective

in reducing problem behaviors. The study used a multiple baseline design which proved

the effectiveness of the reward system on all 3 behaviors. I thought this would be a good

article because it particularly focuses on a token economy reward system which is

something I would use in my consequent intervention.

In the second article, The use and frequency of verbal and non-verbal praise in nurture

groups, the main idea was to look at the effects of positive verbal and non verbal praise

given to students and how it would improve their behavior and self esteem (Bani, M, 2011).

According to the article, the effects of verbal and non verbal praise greatly improved both;

behavior and self esteem. I think that for me this article was particularly useful because it

talks about specifically working with nurture groups. This is kind of like the setting I am

teaching in, so the examples of the specific children involved were easy to relate to my


placement. The results were amazing in how the students responded to the positive verbal

and non verbal praise. For every incidence of positive verbal and non verbal praise, there

were 0 inappropriate behaviors. I think this would work really nicely in my program. It

goes with the flow of the routine and is a very natural reward.

In the third article, Linking descriptive and experimental analysis in the treatment of

bizarre speech, after conducting a functional analysis, it was proven that the student was

engaging in making bizarre noises and comments to gain staff attention during 4 different

conditions (Lalli, J.S, Mace, F.C., 1991). The study used the intervention of scheduled staff

attention as an antecedent strategy to help with decreasing the behavior. The attention was

scheduled on a variable ration occurring between 90s, 60s, and 30s intervals. The student’s

bizarre speech did decrease. When the student did engage in bizarre speech, the student

was completely ignored (extinction). I thought that this was a good article to read because

although it does not relate to my behavior, the scheduled staff attention intervention is

something I want to use in mine, so it gave me an idea of how I can schedule specific

attention.

In the last article, The effects of classroom-based time in/time out on compliance rates

in children with speech and language disabilities, the main purpose was to look at the use of

verbal praise and physical touch had the students complying more with staff, and

decreasing disruptive behavior compared to time out and time in combined (Edwards, R.,

Marlow, A., Olmi, D, Tingstrom, D., 1997). When time in and time out were used together,

the decrease in disruptive behaviors and compliance increased greatly. The term time out

in this study refers to being time away from positive reinforcement. That positive

reinforcement could be a reward, or even just the class room environment, or the activity


for a brief period of time (Edwards et al, 1997, 2). I thought this was particularly

interesting because it is something we do in the classroom currently. We focus mainly on

positive reinforcement, but when the behaviors become increasingly unsafe or

disrespectful; the student must go to time away to talk about what happened. This would

be the very last consequent that would occur if the student proceeded to have major

boundary issues. This article proved the time in/time out strategy to be effective, so it

would be interesting to see how it would work for my student as well.

Intervention Program:

Antecedent Based:

When looking at the hypothesis, and gathering data (A-B-C forms, and FAO), one of

the thoughts was that CW was engaging in invading personal space behavior because he

was seeking attention from peers and adults. For example, he would just get back into the

classroom from a break and would immediately run up to staff and grab their shoulders.

When conducting the FAO it was noted that a lot of his behavior was done when he was

with peers to gain their attention by part taking in inappropriate behavior. For this

intervention, it would be important to create a schedule of attention. After conducting the

FAO, it was apparent that invading personal space behavior was occurring more during

unstructured activities and when he was with his peers. There seemed to be an increase in

invading personal space behavior particularly during recess, and then at times when

independent work was being done in the classroom, so the student did not have the

attention of his peers or all of the staff. With this is mind, during independent work, the

student will need to be given positive attention every couple of minutes. Most individual


work is done during the Math portion of the day 8:40-9:30 and during the literacy block

from 12:15-1:30. Those would be critical times when attention would need to be scheduled

in. When the student is walking back into the classroom from taking a break, staff can greet

him as he walks him, providing him that positive attention he needs. Another time when

attention from staff may need to be scheduled in is during recess. By providing the positive

attention he needs, it may prevent him from having to go up to staff and grabbing their

shoulders. Criterion needs to be determined. Meeting criterion will occur when the student

has 0-1 occurrences of invading personal space for 5 consecutive days. Once the student

meets criteria, then fading can take place and the schedule will get larger in terms of the

length of time and amount of attention the student will be getting.

Alternative skills:

The student engages in invading personal space to gain attention from staff by

grabbing them or touching their arm. It is important that he is taught more appropriate

ways to gain staff attention. Some alternative skills could be for him to give a fist bump. He

would still be receiving the same outcome which is obtaining attention from staff. It is

important that the alternative skill can be taught in conjunction with the antecedent

strategy. If the student is given the scheduled attention, then there is more control over the

teaching opportunities. Since it is easy to determine when the student is about to invade

one’s space, the alternative skill can be taught and prompted before the problem behavior

occurs. As CW walks into the room, staff can immediately remind him, by saying

“remember fist bump if you want to come up say hi, so I know you are back in the room”.

That in particular would be important because it will give him time to think about the


appropriate behavior and not impulsively grab staff to get their attention. Using a fist bump

would be particularly useful and effective because it is not much effort compared to the

problem behavior; he is still gaining the same outcome in an efficient amount of time

(almost instantaneous when he goes up to get a fist bump). From conducting the FAI, it

was apparent that due to CW’s up-bringing, that physical touch and comfort is important to

him. With this type of alternative behavior, there is still some physical interaction, but just

in a more appropriate way.

Consequent Based:

It is important that instruction procedures are being used to teach an alternative

behavior. This could be done by using peer praise. By praising students for modeling

appropriate personal space, it might prompt or cue CW to remember his personal

boundaries and the appropriate distance he should have. Another way to help with

teaching the alternate behavior is prompting. This can be done, by reminding CW that if he

would like a hug or some form of comfort from staff he must ask. If he would like staff

attention, remind him to call staff name and walk up to them to give a fist bump. A gesture

can be used as prompt as well. An example of this is staff holding their arm out in front of

them so CW can see how far he should be. It would be ideal for the student’s behavior to

become extinct because personal space not only poses a boundaries issue, but a safety

issue as well. With that in mind, any time the student invades personal space in a way such

as physically grabbing or touching staff, staff should try and get away from student as soon

as possible and provide little attention other than removing themselves away from the

student. When the student appropriately comes up to them and is standing an arms length


away, the student will be rewarded with a verbal praise. The praise will be directly related

to the student having appropriate personal space. If the student has 10 different

opportunities of appropriate personal space during the school week, he will be rewarded

with time playing the guitar. Getting to play the guitar seems to be a huge motivator for CW

according the Preference Assessment conducted during the functional assessment. If the

student continues to engage in invading personal space in an inappropriate way, and starts

to pose a major boundary issue, the student will be sent to time away where he will do

work out of class with him and one other staff member. I think that teaching a more

appropriate behavior and rewarding that behavior would be most beneficial because CW is

still obtaining the same function in a relatively easy and efficient way.

Data Collection:

Event recording will be used to determine if the frequency of behavior is decreasing

from the use of the interventions in place. Since it may be difficult to have a staff in the

room at all times, a simple data collection procedure will be used. There will be 4, one hour

sessions that take place through-out the school day. Each staff working with that student

during individual will keep data, and when the student is working in the group, the teacher

will keep the data. Data will be done, by keeping 20 pennies in his/her left pocket. Every

time the student engages in the behavior, move one penny from the left pocket over to the

right pocket. At the end of the hour, count how many pennies are in the right pocket.

Record using tallies on the Event Data Recording Sheet. At the end of the day, total the

amount of tallies and that will be the rate at which the behavior was occurring throughout

the day. Do this for one week to see if the intervention is working. The following week


remove the intervention completely. Again, keep track using the provided data collection

with pennies. Record the data received on the Event Data Recording Sheet. The next week,

implement the intervention again, and the following week, take away the intervention. If

you notice that there is an increase in invading personal space behavior during the weeks

where no intervention was taking place, then you can conclude that the intervention is

successful at decreasing invading personal space behavior.


Appendix:

A. Functional Analysis Interview Form (Pages 1-9)B. Multiple Stimuli without Replacement (MSWO) Data SheetC. Data Recording Form w/ directions (Event Recording Blank)D. Baseline Data Recording Forms (2 forms, Ms. Nicki’s Data and Ms. P)

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