Assessment of the convergent validity of the Questions About Behavioral Function scale with analogue functional analysis and the Motivation Assessment Scale

The present study examined the convergent validity of the Questions About B ehavioral Function (QABF) scale, a behavioural checklist for assessing vari ables maintaining aberrant behaviour, with analogue functional analyses and the Motivation Assessment Scale (MAS). The two checklists were more highly correlated with each other than either checklist with results from the ana logue sessions, and the QABF was more highly correlated with analogue sessi ons than the MAS. Using analogue sessions, the experimenters failed to asce rtain behavioural function for a number of subjects because the behaviour p roblems in question were low frequency/high intensity and failed to appear during the course of the analysis, pointing out a limitation of this techno logy. These findings, taken together with recent research outlining the psy chometric properties of the QABF, seem to support the use of the QABF in a hierarchical model of functional analysis. The implications of the findings are discussed.