Re: aversive-punishment interventions

[Guest guest]

Laurie,

this is a very difficult area. ten or fifteen years ago I would have said

that all aversives are unacceptable and should never be utilized. Now I don't

have such a black and white view. If my child were blinding himself with SIB

and medications, ignoring, positive interventions, and everything in my bag of

tricks had been ineffective at stopping the behavior what would I do?

I am not sure. I may consider aversives if it means saving my child's life.

Or would I leave him to a life of physical restraint 24/7 to keep him alive?

But, what standard do we employ as to who can use aversives and under what

situations? Most sp. ed teachers I know aren't trained to deal with significant

behavioral issues and many school districts take the cheapest and quickest

route rather than the best for the child overall. In the last two years I have

watched a school district struggle with my son's behavior. I have been

amazed at the incompetence and my jaw has dropped at some of the aversive

suggestions that the district paid neuropsych has come up with.

Many staff at residential schools and group homes don't have the training

and background to effectively employ positive intervention plans. This shouldn't

mean that their clients receive aversives (that are probably going to be

implemented wrong).

I know that I feel the number of kids who can't respond to a positively

based behavior management program is small and the number of behaviors that need

intervention is often overplayed. What to do for those kids who truly can't or

how to get the best positive intervention to the kids that need it, I don't

have answers for.

karyn

In a message dated 8/3/2006 12:16:06 P.M. Central Standard Time,

writes:

Laurie-

I can identify w/ your concerns re: the ethical and humane treatment

of individuals w/ disabilities. This is a very heated and political

topic in the field currently. As a psychologist and behavior

analyst, I don't agree that aversive types of punishment should be

outlawed entirely. There are many individuals out there that have

been able to achieve a better quality of life as a result of a

punishment procedure decreasing a challenging behavior in their

repertoire (ex: individuals engaging in life threatening self-

injurious behavior that with each day is resulting in increased

levels of brain damage or severely aggressive behavior). I

definitely agree that positive approaches need to be employed as a

first line of treatment for most cases but then there are those rare

cases in which the behavior is so severe that time is of the

essence. Punishment procedures must be monitored significantly by

trained, qualified, licensed professionals with extensive data

collection to measure treatment effectiveness. I guess on the flip

side, is it fair or even ethical for us to take away an intervention

that leaves no other options but for the individual to continue to

experience a poor quality life given their social lives and the

safety of themselves or others are at jeopardy? I've worked with

incredibly gifted & high functioning austistic children that have

severe aggressive behaviors. They don't stand a chance to be an

active contributing member in society as they age and to hold a real

job if they continue to be aggressive. No one will hire them.

Without the option of punishment, if deemed necessary, the lives of

these children will FOREVER be limited. Is that fair? I realize

that these procedures have been abused or poorly supervised at

times, but we must not take those unfortunate instances and outlaw

the use of punishment entirely. Rather, we need to get better at

enforcing laws for monitoring the safe implementation of these types

of procedures. We also need to get better at educating people on

how to prevent challenging behaviors from developing into serious

problems. If we focus on the antecedent end, we can decrease the

need for punishment all together without outlawing it. I realize

this is not the answer you wanted but I understand also where you

are coming from in wanting to protect these individuals given their

vulnerability. I hope we can all find a ground to be in agreement

on. Thansk for your time. Jami