Functional Assessment

Functional Assessments

What is FBA?

FBA is an assessment that identifies challenging behaviours, assumes their function, and guides the development of treatment plans. Children with ASD often exhibit behavioural problems, from aggression and explosions to sometimes self-harm such as head banging. As a parent of a child with ASD, you may be familiar with these behaviours.

All feature evaluations are performed for the same purpose, regardless of the method used. The ultimate goal of the FBA is to identify “behavioural functions” (that is, reasons) and to develop a plan to teach appropriate alternative behaviours.

Common behavioural features include:

  1.  escape
  2.  Ask for attention
  3.  Access to something
  4.  Automatic reinforcement
There are three common feature evaluation methods or categories. We look at each to help you get a better understanding. Note that these methods may have different names.

Indirect functional evaluation

No one knows your child better than you, and teachers, caregivers, and other celebrities probably know them better. Indirect functional assessments are so-called because information is often collected based on the personal observations of people close to your child. Indirect functional assessment methods include rating scales, questionnaires, and interviews. Your goal is to collect assessments of possible causes of behavioural problems in your child
An example of indirect functional evaluation is the Functional Analysis Screening Tool (FAST). It includes a 16-item questionnaire that anyone familiar with your child’s behaviour, what happens before the behaviour, and the consequences can do it.
A free-form functional assessment session asks you to elaborate on your child’s behaviour, including when it occurs, its nature, and possible causes.

Observation (direct) function evaluation

As the name implies, observation methods include the therapist observing your child directly in the natural environment. In addition to your child, the session can include you, a caregiver, a teacher, and other people who interact with him / her. The ABA therapist first observes the child to determine the type of challenging behaviour. If that happens, he or she records what happened before the incident, what the behaviour looks like, what happened after it, and possible causes.

Timing diagrams are the method used in observation function analysis. A mark is placed on the chart to indicate the date and time when a particular action occurred. This information allows you to identify possible causes of behaviour, such as a particular time of day, activity, location, event, or people. Suppose your child wakes up at 7 pm every day. Charts may show that behaviour occurs during bathing. The therapist then tries to understand why bathing time is related to behaviour or how bathing contributes to the problem.

The data collected during the functional observational assessment is analysed based on history, behaviour, and outcome (ABC of behaviour).

Functional analysis

Functional analysis (FA) was developed to look for possible features (reasons) behind challenging behaviour. This method is based on decades of accumulated research. FA measures four common areas and compares them to game / control conditions. Attention-Used to determine if an action is taking place to draw attention from someone (for example, verbally or physically).

Request – Used to determine if an action is occurring to avoid or avoid a task request or activity.

Tangible – Evaluates whether an action has taken place to access a particular person or activity. Alone-See what happens when a child is alone in a room without toys or other activities.
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