Positive Behaviour Support - Department of Human Services - Vic ...

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Positive behaviour support: Getting it right from the start - Facilitators reference manual 65
Step 3: What message is the person communicating via the behaviour
of concern?
Behaviours of concern serve a function or purpose for the person. The most common reasons
people show behaviours of concern are often the same as why all people communicate. An
analysis of the behavioural recording will have generated some ideas (hypotheses) about the
function of the behaviour that is any patterns to the behaviour. Hypotheses regarding the
function or relationship between the behaviour and the individual’s environment can lead to
identifying positive behaviour support strategies. Be aware however that a single behaviour of
concern may serve more than one function.
The function that a behaviour serves has direct implications for how we respond to the
behaviour. For example it could be decided to ignore a person who is engaging in the behaviour
of head banging. In the long term this may lessen the behaviour in a person who head bangs
exclusively to gain social interaction. However the exact same strategy could worsen the
behaviour for another person who bangs because they prefer to stay alone, since this response
may reinforce the behaviour that ‘I bang my head and people leave me alone’.
In the above scenarios both people are communicating through their behaviour, that they would
like more or less attention and it is important to listen to this. However one must try and respond
in a way that is not simply a direct reaction to the head banging.
The following are some of the most common messages being communicated via behaviours:
• Gaining social interaction
• Escape or avoidance of demands
• Gaining access to preferred activities or tangible objects
• Sensory feedback (e.g. hand flapping, eye poking)
• Pursuit of power and control over own life
• Reduction of arousal and anxiety.
Analysing the information you have collected using the STAR chart and the MAS; what
messages do you think your focus person is trying to communicate.
Why?
Analyse the STAR charts below, do you agree with the assessment of the function of the
behaviours identified?
What else could these behaviours be communicating?
Why?