Functional Analysis of Autistic Severe Problematic Behavior

From the perspective of the science of behavior, functional analysis has been one of the most used methodologies to assess severe problematic behaviors in autistic individuals. Functional analysis is a synthesis of the "cause-and-effect relationships" expressed in quantitative terms that identify the conditions that determine the occurrence or non-occurrence of a problematic behavior (Skinner, 2005; Iwata, Dorsey, Slifer, Bauman, & Richman, 1982/1994; Van Camp, et. al. 2000). However, functional analysis does not always give accurate information about the function of the behavior, especially for severe self-injurious behavior, property destruction, and aggression.

Dr. Henry Roane in his presentation at the 2008 Applied Behavior Analysis International Annual Convention (ABAI) in Chicago pointed out that for some autistic individuals with severe and complicated problematic behaviors, functional analysis does not easily identify the reinforcers that maintain the behavior. Dr. Roane found that “the outcome data presented by previous researchers suggest that 4-15% of functional analysis results yield undifferentiated outcomes.” Occasionally, the maladaptive behavior is maintained by idiosyncratic stimuli, which are unusual environmental stimuli such as an odor, color, noise, texture, or a person, a variety of repetitive behaviors among other conditions, that are not normally the focus of functional analysis or are often assumed to be maintained by automatic reinforcement. Normally, functional analysis identifies such causes as attention seeking, escape-avoidance from demands; obtainment of tangible items or edibles, and control conditions (e.g. lack of structure/boredom, limited repertoires or lack of sensory input) (Iwata et al. (1982/1994).

Descriptive observations may yield information that lead to the identification of idiosyncratic reinforcers that sustain the maladaptive behaviors. For instance, severe self-injurious behaviors, property destruction and aggressive behaviors may occur when repetitive behavior is interrupted or prevented, when staff may allow resumption of repetitive behavior contingent upon destructive behaviors or is reinforced by access to repetitive behavior. Dr. Roane reviewed several cases where a destructive behavior was maintained by access to items, such as when a consumer gains access to a wrist band that triggers a hand biting response.

Dr. Roane illustrated in his ABAI presentation in Chicago that Behavior Analysts face a number of challenges when using common functional analysis. One of the challenges is understanding that complex self-injurious behaviors or severe aggressive behaviors are not always maintained by the type of reinforcements that behavioral analysts generally look for. Behavior Analyst needs to identify the idiosyncratic stimuli before the implementation of functional analysis (Van Camp, et. al. 2000; Carr et. al. 1997). Anytime that the Behavior Analyst finds a discrepancy between the interview information and the functional analysis data, he or she should suspect that the severe problematic behavior is maintained by idiosyncratic stimulus. One issue Behavioral Analysts would need to discuss is how to develop a standard methodology to identify these kinds of stimuli. Without the identification of idiosyncratic stimuli that maintain severe problematic behaviors, the Behavior Analysts may generate an unclear functional analysis and a behavioral intervention that is less effective (Carr et. al. 1997).