Rp. Hastings et B. Remington, STAFF BEHAVIOR AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR PEOPLE WITH LEARNING-DISABILITIES AND CHALLENGING BEHAVIORS, British journal of clinical psychology, 33, 1994, pp. 423-438
Many people with learning disabilities engage in challenging behaviour
s which, behaviour analytic models suggest, are social behaviours sens
itive to the actions of others in the environment. In this paper, the
research literature on the behaviour of staff, especially that pertain
ing to interactions with people with challenging behaviours, is review
ed. Empirical evidence is found to support the hypothesis that staff a
ctions affect clients' challenging behaviours. In addition, studies of
staff behaviour shaw that their behaviour is often counter-habilitati
ve. Firstly, staff spend little time interacting with clients and the
quality of these interactions is often poor. Secondly, observational s
tudies have shown that staff respond intermittently to challenging beh
aviours, and self-report studies indicate that many of these responses
are of a nature that may reinforce such behaviours. Finally, although
limited, evidence suggests that behavioural programmes for clients wi
th challenging behaviours are rare and where they do exist they are of
ten not carried out by staff. To date, interventions for staff behavio
ur (training and management approaches) have acted to change these way
s of behaving but have not been founded on adequate analyses of staff
action. A call is made for analyses of staff behaviour, and other impl
ications for research and practical work with staff are discussed.