The jack tizzard memorial lecture decreasing behaviours: Clinical, ethical, and environmental issues

This paper addresses a number of issues that relate to the successful development of reductive treatment programs by looking at why programs fail. It begins by describing those behavioural characteristics of a behaviour change agent that distinguish the behavioural artist from the behavioural technologist. Factors that are discussed as contributing to programmatic failure include the reactive intervention model, improper use of behavioural experts, poor target behaviour selection, systemic problems, an inadequate understanding and application of positive reinforcement, and the language of behaviour modification. Why clients misbehave is then discussed from a number of perspectives including reinforcement, the nature of the task, physiological problems, and programmatic decay. The paper concludes with suggestions for ensuring programmatic mainteance that resulted from the findings of a 10 year follow-up study.