Intervention and Treatment Selection
From assessment to plan
Intervention selection follows from function, context, client values, and evidence. Build goals that are observable, measurable, and socially valid. Prioritize behaviors that are dangerous, frequently occurring, or pivotal for further skill development. Write operational definitions that a stranger could use reliably.
Selecting and sequencing components
Consider antecedent versus consequence strategies, skill acquisition versus behavior reduction, and least restrictive options. Combine function-based interventions with generalization planning: teach across settings, people, and stimuli; program maintenance; use indiscriminable contingencies and natural communities of reinforcement. Treatment integrity and data-based decision rules govern whether to continue, modify, or discontinue.
Evidence and collaboration
Prefer interventions with empirical support for the target population and behavior. Collaborate with caregivers and other providers; align goals across environments. Consider cultural and contextual fit.
Common traps
Selecting a packaged program without functional assessment; choosing a punishment-based plan because it is quick; ignoring generalization; failing to specify decision criteria in advance.
Rule of thumb
A defensible plan answers four questions: what behavior, what function, what procedure matched to that function, and how will we know it worked?
Worked example
For a child who engages in tantrums to obtain toys, a plan might combine functional communication training (requesting), noncontingent access during transitions, extinction of tantrum-maintained access, and generalization across caregivers-with pre-specified criteria for fading.