Data Collection & Data-based Decision Making

1. Data Collection & Data-based Decision Making Julie Smith, M.A., BCBA Maigret Fay, M.Ed, BCBA Amy Cohen, PhD, BCBA HowardCenter Autism Spectrum Program July 12th, 2011

2. Objectives • Reasons • Most common topics to record data on • Data collection methods • Examples of data collection forms • Practice data collection • Develop methods for your students

3. Why collect data? • Determine the behavior targeted for change • Helps determine the function of the behavior • Shows if intervention is working • Supports accurate decision making • Determines preferences and reinforcement • Can show progress and rate of skill acquisition • Allows for credibility from other team members

4. Definitions of Evidence-Based Practice • Evidence-based practice is an approach that tries to specify the way in which professionals or other decision-makers should make decisions by identifying such evidence that there may be for a practice, and rating it according to how scientifically sound it may be. Its goal is to eliminate unsound or excessively risky practices in favor of those that have better outcomes

5. What is Applied Behavior Analysis? • A discipline committed to the understanding and improvement of human behavior • Focuses on objectively defined, observable behaviors of social significance • Seeks to improve behavior while demonstrating reliability between applied interventions and the noted improvement

6. ABA defined (cont.) • APPLIED • Refers to the social significance of the behavior • Of immediate importance to the individual or society • BEHAVIOR • Behavior is in need of improvement • Behavior must be observable and measurable

7. ABA defined (cont.) • ANALYSIS • Believability • Demonstrates a functional relationship between behavior and intervention • controls the occurrence and nonoccurrence of a behavior • We change behavior by changing the ENVIRONMENT

8. National Standards Project from the National Autism Center • 11 Established Treatments are: • Antecedent Package • Behavioral Package • Comprehensive Behavioral Treatment for Young Children • Joint Attention Intervention • Modeling • Naturalistic Teaching Strategies • Peer Training Package • Pivotal Response Treatment • Schedules • Self-management • Story-based Intervention Package • 22 Emerging Treatments

9. Activity • What data collection methods do you use currently? • Who collects the data? • How do you collect the data? • What do you do with the data?

10. Data Collection • Descriptive Analysis • Preference/Reinforcer Assessments • Skill Acquisition • Daily living skills

11. Behavior

12. What Is Behavior? • An action, resulting in environmental change • It can have one or more measurable dimensions - frequency, duration, intensity • Observable and measurable • Unseen event can influence the occurrence of behavior • e.g. internal thoughts, illness, etc

13. ABC Data Collection Descriptive Analysis • Descriptive Analysis refers to the process of obtaining direct and daily information concerning the context of challenging behavior • Usually done through “A-B-C” analysis

14. A-B-C Data

15. ABC Data Collection Functional Behavioral Assessment (FBA) • The process of obtaining information on events which precede and follow a behavior to determine which antecedents and consequences are reliably associated with the occurrence and nonoccurrence of the behavior

16. ABC Data • Antecedent • Record events or interactions that happen DIRECTLY BEFORE the behavior occurs. Examples: “teacher gave instruction to clean up” or “fire alarm went off”. • Behavior • Should include only OBSERVABLE behavior. Do NOT include guesses at internal states such as emotions. Be as SPECIFIC as possible. Example: "hit my hand with a ruler hard enough to leave a mark," "Yelled dummy directed toward staff," "picked up math paper and ripped into many pieces“. • Consequence • Should be what occurs DIRECTLY following the behavior, including verbal interactions from staff/ peers, physical interactions from staff, any type of prompting, etc. Example: “gave no verbal response and physically prompted him to pick up toy truck by taking his arm and gently guiding him to the truck" “said “not ok. Time to clean up and pointed to toy”.

17. ABC Data Sheet Example

18. ABC Data Sheet-Checklist Example

19. ABC Summary Analysis Examples

20. ABC Summary Analysis Examples

21. Other Information Learned Through Direct Observation • Frequency • How many times did the behavior occur? • Duration • How long did the child engage in the behavior? • Latency • How long did it take the student to respond to the instruction? • Intensity • What did the behavior look like on a scale of …? • Time of Day (Scatterplot)

22. Frequency • How often the behavior occurs • Tallies, clickers (color coded, labeled), pennies/items transferred from one pocket to the other pocket, objects in a container

23. Duration • How long the behavior occurs • Stop watches, timers, clocks

24. Intensity • How “much” of a behavior occurs Ex. Self-Injury-Biting Arm Intensity Rating Scale • Rating Scale (1-4) • 1=Mouth on arm, no visible mark • 2=Mouth on arm, red mark • 3=Mouth on arm, indentations of teeth visible • 4=Mouth on arm, broken skin

25. Interval Recording • Coding the presence or absence of a specific behavior during a predetermined time period • May include frequencies of behavior within an interval or measures of the rate of the behavior

26. Interval Recording Data Sheet • Partial interval- record whether the behavior occurred at any time during the interval • Whole interval- record whether the behavior occurred throughout the interval • Momentary time sampling- record whether the behavior occurs at the moment the interval ends.

27. Activity • What behaviors did you observe? • Choose one • How would you measure that behavior? • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U35q146wMZo&feature=related

28. Graphic Displays • Use of line, bar or pie graphs to describe the occurrence of a behavior over time or the proportions of behavior • Very helpful in evaluating the effectiveness of a treatment procedure and in determining when to change a procedure

29. Line Graph Example

30. Line Graph Example

31. Line Graph Example

32. ActivityRecord this data on graph paper

33. Graph

34. ActivityRecord this data on graph paper

35. Graph

36. Skill Building

37. Reinforcement Definition: Reinforcement occurs when a particular behavior is followed by an immediate consequence that results in strengthening the behavior. • Is unique to each individual • Is ever changing • Moment to Moment • With experience • With development • Needs to be flexible

38. Reinforcer Assessment Activity • Rank in order • 1=most desired • 5=least desired

39. Reinforcer Assessment Activity Rank these activities 1 to 5 • Hike in the woods • Massage • A day of shopping with friends • Reading by a roaring fire • Trying out a new recipe

40. Reinforcer Assessment Activity • Consider the variability of preference • Within the group • Within yourself on a given day

41. Reinforcer Assessment Methods • Interview • Individual • Others in the individual’s life • Observation • Standardized Assessments Comparative Trials • “Forced Choice”

42. Forced Choice

43. IEP Goal Sample • By November 2011, Kevin will demonstrate his understanding of quantity by identifying, ordering, and labeling different objects to numbers with 90% accuracy. • Obj. 1: by April 2011, Kevin will identify 1:1 correspondence of a set of objects 1-10 with 90% accuracy

44. Ex of Assessment

45. Program

46. Data sheet

47. Activity • By November 2011, Joe will make no more than one threat/act of aggression (towards self or others) as defined by attached behavior plan per day. • Objective 1:By January 2011, Joe will make no more than 4 threats/act of aggression towards others or himself per day.

48. Activity • What data would you record to come up with objectives/goal? • What data would you collect? • How/when would you record data for this objective? • Who would record the data? • Practice…

49. Acquisition Graph

50. Acquisition Graph