examples of adaptive behavior assessments

25. Because adaptive behavior scales are designed with applicability for a wide age range but with primary emphasis on childhood and adolescence, some items may not be suitably worded or may not reflect a performance that is age-relevant. Adaptive behavior is behavior that is positive and functional to the individual. This chapter contains material drawn from an unpublished paper commissioned by the committee from Sharon Borthwick-Duffy, Ph.D., University of California, Riverside. The standardization sample consisted mostly (80 percent) of adults living in residential facilities, and the overall functioning level of the sample may be lower than if other community-dwelling adults had been included (Harrison, 1998). It is particularly useful for evaluating those with developmental delays, autism spectrum disorder, intellectual disability, learning disabilities, neuropsychological disorders, and sensory or physical impairments.</p> A herd of wildebeest, schools of fish, and flocks of birds are all examples of this concept. In particular, criticism has focused on the inadequacy of existing techniques for measuring the social domain of adaptive behavior (MacMillan et al., in press). Widaman and McGrew (1996) further argued that agreement on a common set of terms for domains of adaptive behavior (in contrast to the use of or as above) would contribute to a better consensus on the structure of adaptive behavior. Behavior identification supporting assessment Avoiding danger 6. As the importance of adaptive behavior measures in classification of mental retardation has increased, this concern has been heightened as disproportionate numbers of minority children have been identified as having mental retardation, primarily because of low-income status and the overrepresentation of individuals with mental retardation among low-income people (Boyle et al., 1996). There is a much larger number of scales that do not have extensive norms but may nonetheless be suitable as a means of gathering and summarizing information that can be assessed on a clinical basis. This scale is the Psychiatric Assessment Schedule for Adults with Developmental Disability or PASS-ADD (Moss et al., 1996, 1998, 2000; Prosser et al., 1998). In Chapter 1 we provided the details of SSA's criteria for a disability determination of mental retardation in terms of both mental capacity and adaptive functioning. Additional measures of social cognition or social skills and issues relevant to social skills assessment of people with mental retardation have been discussed further (Bell-Dolan & Allan, 1998; Blacher, 1982; Blake & Andrasik, 1986; Jackson et al., 1981; Matson et al., 1983; Meyer et al., 1990; Monti, 1983; Smith & Greenberg, 1979; Van Hasselt et al., 1981). A widely used technique, which was first employed by Spivack and Shure (1974), is to present the individual with a story describing a social problem, as well as a particular strategy that the protagonist might use to resolve the problem. The assessment of adaptive behavior is complex. Social perception refers to an individual's ability to interpret or read relevant social messages from others (Maheady et al., 1984). A consequence of this, according to Thompson et al., is the inability to develop precise measures of adaptive behavior that would objectively differentiate individuals by disability. To some extent, inclusion of participants representative of the general population, including racial and ethnic minorities, in norming samples should mitigate against biases in scoring of adaptive behavior scales. Specifically, a comprehensive adaptive behavior assessment should include information obtained from: 1. The information obtained from this type of evaluation can clarify the nature and extent of the limitations those individuals with mild mental retardation experience in adapting their behavior to meet the social demands and expectations of the school, workplace, and recreational and residential settings. At the turn of the century, intelligence assessment placed primary emphasis on moral behavior (which largely comports with the current construct of social competence) and on the pragmatics of basic academics. A more recent study by Watkins et al. Both structured and semistructured interviews, when performed by well-trained and experienced clinicians, appear to be the best available safeguard against threats to the reliability and the validity of adaptive behavior assessment. The value of such instruments will depend on careful decisions about instrument choice, score interpretation, and consideration of other information that bears on adaptive status. Over the past 25 years there has also been further refinement of the parameters and structure of tests of adaptive behavior and social competence. Sociometric ratings provide useful information but are impractical for diagnostic purposes, and the use of nonstandardized rating forms is not recommended for diagnosis of significant limitations in social skills. Diagnostic decisions about mental retardation nearly always involve normative comparisons using various derived scores. The DABS measures adaptive behavior in these three areas: Conceptual skills: literacy; self-direction; and concepts of number, money, and time. This has generalized to adaptive behavior measures. - To improve children's physical fitness and motor . Adaptive Behavior Assessment Examples. Refusal to perform a task that a person is capable of doing is also a reflection of problem behavior and should not be considered in relation to adaptive behavior. Manuals for the major adaptive behavior scales encourage the use of multiple informants, for example, teachers and parents. Typically these measures are structured in terms of factors, domains, and subdomains or scales. For example, assessments are used during classroom instruction to measure students' learning related to the academic content, and different assessments are used to measure students' overall cognitive, physical, or social . In a national survey of school psychologists, only three scales were found to be in wide use for diagnosis: the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, the Scales of Independent Behavior, and the AAMR Adaptive Behavior Scale-School Edition (Stinnett et al., 1994). For example, the Test of Social Inference (TSIde Jung et al., 1973) employs the technique of presenting an individual with mild mental retardation with illustrations of common social situations and asking him or her, for each illustration, to tell the examiner what the picture is about. TARGET: Texas Guide for Effective Teaching Adaptive Behavior Assessment ADAPTIVE BEHAVIOR ASSESSMENT OVERVIEW OF INSTRUMENTS Adaptive behavior is a critical part of assessing students who have or are suspected of having autism spectrum disorder (Volkmar, et al., 2014). For older adolescents, ages 18 to 21, the difficulty level of items often permits identification of either delayed or typical skills. The standardization sample was proportional in demographic characteristics to the 1980 census data. Although schools may be the service settings in which adaptive behavior measures are most likely to be used, the information derived from these assessments may not be considered meaningful for the purposes of classification by decision makers. It is reported to be appropriate for ages 5-22, yet it may not have a sufficient ceiling to discriminate performance levels among children above age 14 (Evans & Bradley-Johnson, 1988). In so doing, AAMR ignores the substantial theoretical and empirical foundation that validates the difference between individuals with mild mental retardation and other individuals with mental retardation (MacMillan et al., in press). Does the person recognize that a social problem has occurred? Another, more open-ended assessment technique is to present a social problem and then to ask the interviewee to relate everything that is going through the protagonist's mind as he or she tries to decide what to do about resolving the problem (e.g., Hickson et al., 1998; Jenkinson & Nelms, 1994). However, research that indicates a causal relationship between the childrearing practices of minority families in North America and developmental delay is very limited. The utility of the WHODAS II remains to be established as a means to consolidate adaptive or maladaptive behavior information of value in informing the SSI and DI eligibility determination process. Adaptive behavior is defined as the set of skills that individuals should be able to perform at a certain age. The Adaptive Behaviour Assessment System, Third Edition (ABAS-III) is a multidimensional and standardised assessment tool used to assess the functional skills necessary for the daily living of individuals from birth to 89 years of age. One particular adaptive behavior scale was ranked 17th in use among 38 scales, but less than 15 percent of respondents reported using this scale frequently. In this definition, the order of the constructs can be switched without affecting the validity of the definition. (1996) put it, relatively immature, as opposed to deviant, social behavior has always been the central distinguishing feature of this disability (pp. Student assessment results from formal, standardized assessment tools are often statistically based and can be very difficult for families to understand. In other instances, scales may be constructed such that they are relevant to only certain age groups (e.g., the motor scale in the Vineland ABS), or different versions of the same scale may be used in different settings (e.g., school versus residential and community settings). Table 4-3, adapted from Harrison and Oakland (2000b), shows the percentage of adaptive behavior domain scores for a sample of children with mild mental retardation (N = 66) and controls without mental retardation matched for gender, age, and socioeconomic status (N = 66) that scored below the 2 SD standard on the teacher form of the ABAS. These practices persisted over that century because of the absence of standardized assessment procedures. Generally, these instruments do not have well-established norms but rather have been assessed for their sensitivity with diagnosed cases (e.g., Reiss & Valenti-Hein, 1994), and some scales are more suitable for youth than for children: the Assessment of Dual Diagnosis (Matson & Bamburg, 1998); the Psychopathology Instrument for Mentally Retarded Adults (Balboni et al., 2000; Linaker, 1991; Sturmey & Ley, 1990; Watson et al., 1988); and the Reiss Screen for Maladaptive Behavior (Havercamp & Reiss, 1997; Prout, 1993; Sturmey & Bertman, 1994) For practitioners skilled in clinical interviewing, a field-tested adaptation of a structured clinical interview is available. Adams (2000), in contrast, uses a mixture of typical performance with third-party respondents and maximum performance operations. An attempt was made to select items that would avoid ceiling effects for the normal population and to ensure basal measures for the population with mental retardation. It also allows for reconciliation of ratings among these informants. Regardless of the assessment type . There is evidence that the ABI has adequate construct, content, and criterion-related validity, as well as internal reliability, but no data were provided on interrater reliability. If an appropriate respondent is not available, use of the instrument in some other way (e.g., self-report, unless a self-report version of the protocol is available) violates basic standardization procedures, rendering normative comparisons invalid. Instead, they differentiate individuals with mental retardation based on the supports they need. Thus, adaptive behavior scales have particular relevance in application with preschoolers and with teens, who are often participants in Supplemental Security Income (SSI) determinations or redeterminations. . ASEBA behavior rating scales include the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), the Caregiver-Teacher Report Form (C-TRF), the Teacher Report Form (TRF), the Youth Self-Report (YSR), the Adult Behavior Checklist (ABCL), the Adult Self-Report (ASR), the Older Adult Behavior Checklist (OABCL), and the Older Adult Self-Report (OASR). . Greenspan and colleagues (Greenspan, 1999; Greenspan & Driscoll, 1997; Greenspan & Granfield, 1992) have argued that social intelligence, some aspects of which are not contained on any current scales of adaptive behavior or social skills (e.g., credulity, gullibility), should be a key determinant of a diagnosis of mental retardation for adults (Figure 4-2). Doll objected to the definition of mental retardation in terms of mental age, which had proven problematic in IQ testing (because it resulted in classification of a significant proportion of the population). Useful score scales and appropriate norms are vital features of adaptive behavior instruments used in diagnostic decisions. In our judgment, good clinical practice requires that data from standardized adaptive behavior scales be combined with other clinical or behaviorally oriented information in determining the presence or the absence of adaptive behavior deficits. The third scale is a classroom form (VABS-C), appropriate for children ages 3-12, and can be completed by the teacher fairly quickly. These concerns are heightened when informants have a stake in the outcome of the assessment (e.g., when responses may affect eligibility for services). Problems with assessing long term and short term adaptation One problem with assessments of adaptive behavior is that a behavior that appears adaptive in the short run can be maladaptive in the long run and vice versa. Measures used in schools may not need a work domain, for example, if students are too young for employment or the school does not have a work experience program. Direct measures from target individuals involve presenting them with hypothetical situations and conducting direct observations. Vineland-II forms aid in diagnosing and classifying intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD, formerly known as mental retardation) and other disorders, such as autism spectrum disorders and developmental delays. Most adaptive behavior instruments have a number of subscales or subtests that measure four to six broad areas of independence. Comprehensive adaptive behavior measures are those that assess adaptive behavior through multiple items in multiple domains of functioning. Nonetheless, it should always be recognized that items in adaptive behavior measures represent a sampling of items that have passed reliability and validity screens, rather than a complete characterization of adaptive behavior. Adaptive behavior is the collection of conceptual, social, and practical skills that all people learn in order to function in their daily lives. These findings are also evident in analyses of other adaptive behavior scale data (Jacobson, 1997) and client registry or population data sets (Jacobson, 1992; Larson et al., 2000; Lubin et al., 1982). Scales typically include items that permit behavioral assessments for young children and adolescents without disabilities (i.e., superior behavioral development or skill). The social-cognitive processes and the approaches that are used to measure them can also inform and enrich the interviews that examiners conduct with individuals with mild mental retardation and other informants. 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