A component analysis of ABC assessments as demonstrated through function based interventions

Research demonstrates that in order to implement a successful behavior analytic intervention, one must first identify the maintaining contingencies of the target behavior. Descriptive assessments are the most commonly used functional assessment used by behavior analysts (Oliver et al., 2015), although, comparative research further supports the use of analog functional analyses over descriptive assessments. As a way to assess the components of descriptive assessments to increase their accuracy, antecedent-behavior-consequence (ABC) assessments and functional analysis procedures were used to analyze the key components of descriptive assessment and were then verified with the implementation of a function-based intervention. Results indicated that conditional probabilities from the antecedent condition were verified as the function in the functional analysis and treatment. Implications for clinicians and researchers are reviewed.