A Family-Centered Positive Behavior Support Approach To Addressing The Problem Behaviors Of Children With Autism

Because of their deficiency in communication and social development, children with autism are more likely to develop problem behaviors. These problem behaviors, if happen in the family or community settings, will have significant negative impacts on these children's families and exert great stress on their parents. Considering these facts, it is necessary to explore the effective approaches to addressing problem behaviors of children with autism in the family context.Family-centered positive behavior support is a new approach to addressing children's problem behaviors in the home settings and has been proven to be effective by some studies carried out in Western countries. However, there is little research focusing on its application in Chinese families raising children with disabilities. So the primary goal of this study is to examine if the family-centered positive behavior support approach could be used in Chinese families raising children with autism and how to use this approach in these families. Besides, since positive behavior support is based on the functional assessment of behaviors, the other goal of this study is to explore the function of problem behaviors of children with autism in the family context and its relation to any family-related factors. Thus, this study includes the following two parts.In the first part, the functional assessment interview and ABC observation were used to examine the function of problem behaviors in two children with autism in the family settings. The results showed that the two children's problem behaviors functioned to escape aversive activity or to get sensory regulation/sensory stimulation. Moreover, negative parent-child interaction pattern was found to contribute to the problem behaviors with the social reinforcement function, but have little relation to those with the sensory regulation/stimulation function.Based on the results of the functional assessment in the first part of the study, the second part, as a combination of action research and single subject research, aimed to investigate if the family-centered positive behavior support approach could be applied to a Chinese family raising a child with autism and how to use this approach in this family. The results showed that the family-centered positive behavior support approach could be accepted by the family and effectively ameliorated the child's problem behaviors during the bedtime routine and improved the family's quality of life to a certain degree.