Instruction in Functional Assessment, 2014a

Instruction in Functional Assessment Chapter 6
Table 21
Steps involved in conducting a FA
To conduct a functional assessment the professional must:
1. Behaviorally define the client’s challenging behavior
2. Review referral form and records
3. Conduct indirect and/or observational functional assessments
4. Evaluate the reliability and validity of the data
5. Develop a functional hypothesis regarding the maintaining variable for the problem
behavior
6. Design a functional analysis; indicate advantages and disadvantages of this approach
7. State the ethical issues and considerations for assessment
8. Test hypothesis by implementing functional analysis conditions, and collecting data
9. Graph the data collected, and interpret findings
10. Determine function of the individual’s challenging behavior
11. Design behavior intervention plan based on function of the individual’s problem
behavior and other factors (e.g., context, quality of the environment, severity of the
problem behavior, people present, resources available, setting, etc.)
12. Select a functionally-equivalent replacement behavior, prevention approaches, active
teaching procedures; and reactive procedures for when the problem behavior occurs
13. State the ethical principles and procedures involved in the treatment phase
Comprehensively Teaching the Functional
Assessment Process
Descriptions in the research literature of efforts to teach a comprehensive set of practitioner
skills have been few. One early demonstration of a comprehensive training program
to teach undergraduate psychology students to provide clinical or in-home consultative
services was described by Keeley, Shemberg, and Ferber (1973). This training program involved:
(a) content and practice in observing and recording behavior, (b) interventions, and
(c) professional and ethical skills. The instructional approach involved lectures, role plays,
and problem-solving client cases. The authors report positive results of this program to
teach 37 senior-level psychology students how to deliver services to individuals with developmental
disabilities and their families; however, no systematic evaluation of the program
was performed.
In a more recent research evaluation of a comprehensive therapist training program,
Chok, Shlesinger, Studer, and Bird (2012) describe a curriculum that involves teaching four
components including: (a) conducting FAn sessions, (b) interpreting graphs, (c) responding
to undifferentiated data, and (d) designing treatments. Participants completed assignments
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