A comparison of outcomes from descriptive and functional analyses of problem behavior

We compared results of descriptive and functional analyses of problem behavior for 12 participants whose descriptive data have been reported previously (Thompson & Iwata, 2001). Results indicated that in only 3 of the 12 cases was problem behavior maintained by the consequence observed most frequently during the descriptive analysis. Attention was the most common consequence for problem behavior during descriptive analyses for 8 of the 12 participants; however, maintenance of problem behavior by attention was evident for only 2 of these 8 participants.