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Abstract
This study investigated the relationship between problem behaviors and academic variables in classrooms. Functional behavioral assessments conducted with two fourth grade students indicated that academic variables occasioned and maintained problem behaviors. Two behavior support interventions were developed for each participant. One intervention was designed using a competing pathways model that combined behavioral and academic supports, and linked the intervention components to the functional assessment results. A second intervention was drawn from the literature, but did not match the functional assessment results. A single-case, reversal design was used to assess the effects of the function-based versus non-function-based interventions. Results indicated the function-based academic interventions resulted in significantly fewer problem behaviors than were observed during non-function-based interventions. The results lend support to the idea that interventions for problem behaviors that occur in the classroom context will be most successful if based on functional behavioral assessments.
A growing body of literature suggests that students' academic and behavioral problems are often closely and functionally related (Burke, Hagan-Burke, & Sugai, 2003; Carr, Newsom, & Binkoff, 1980; DePaepe, Shores, Jack, & Denny, 1996; Dunlap, White, Vera, Wilson, & Panacek, 1996; Ervin, DuPaul, Kern, & Friman, 1998; Gickling & Armstrong, 1978; Hoff, Ervin, & Friman, 2005; Kern, Delaney, Clarke, Dunlap, & Childs, 2001; Lee, Sugai, & Horner, 1999; Mcintosh, Horner, Chard, Boland, & Good, 2006; Roberts, Marshall, Nelson, & Albers, 2001). This literature focuses on the role that academic variables play in occasioning and maintaining problem behaviors, the most common of which is that a mismatch between student skill level and task demands establish escape as a powerful reinforcer for problem behavior. For example, math tasks that are in the frustrational range occasion more off-task problem behavior than math tasks in a student's instructional range (Calderhead, Filter, & Albin, 2006; Lee et al., 1999; Roberts et al., 2001) while math and reading tasks in the mastery range can be aversive because they are too easy (Gickling & Armstrong, 1978; Umbreit, Lane, & Dejud, 2004). The length of tasks (Dunlap et al., 2001), the instructional medium of the task (Ervin et al., 1998), and students' interest-level in the subject matter (Hoff et al., 2005; Kern et al., 2001) have also been identified as antecedents to escape-maintained problem behavior.
Academic variables that...