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Abstract. The current study meta-analyzed 47 single-subject studies of behavioral self-management interventions that were published between 1971 and 2011. In addition to obtaining an overall measure of effect across all self-management studies ([straight phi]=0.93), analyses were conducted to assess whether treatment effectiveness was moderated by factors such as student characteristics (e.g., grade level, student disability) or the intervention components included. Although no significant differences were identified depending on the grade level of the student or educational setting, lower effect sizes were identified for students diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and specific learning disabilities. Additionally, stronger effect sizes were identified in those studies that (a) assessed student rating accuracy, (b) asked students to reflect on their behavior over a period of time, and (c) did not incorporate evaluation or rewards. The implications of these findings for applied use and future research are discussed.
Psychological studies dating back to the 1950s relied on the use of self-recorded data to obtain the most accurate record of private behaviors (e.g., calories consumed, cigarettes smoked), with no mention made of the potential for reactivity (e.g., Stollak, 1967). However, in the late 1960s, researchers began to acknowledge and discuss the fact that simply asking participants to record aspects of their own behavior may result in behavioral changes above and beyond those anticipated as the result of treatment (McFall, 1970; Webb, Campbell, Schwartz, & Sechrest, 1966). It was not long before this process of observing and recording one's own behavior was adapted for intervention use and came to be known as self-monitoring. In one of the first studies that brought self-monitoring procedures into school settings, students were taught to tally the number of times they verbally participated in class in an attempt to increase this behavior (Gottman & McFall, 1972). Behavioral improvements were particularly notable given the simplicity of the procedures, with students simply turning in their recording slips at the end of the period with no further discussion or debriefing. Self-monitoring may be effective in changing behavior because the prompts to self-monitor may serve as cues to perform the desired behavior (Cole & Bambara, 1992; Reid, 1996), or the simple act of paying more attention to one's behavior may produce a reactivity effect (Nelson & Hayes, 1981).
Although many...