A Comparison of Isolated and Synthesized Contingencies in Functional Analyses

Abstract

In a series of recent studies, Hanley and colleagues have evaluated the efficacy of an FA methodology termed the Interview Informed Synthesized Contingency Analyses (IISCA; Hanley, Jin, Vanselow, & Hanratty, 2014), which involves conducting (a) an open-ended interview to determine potential antecedents, consequences, and precursors to target problem behavior; (b) a brief observation based on the interview results; and (c) test and control conditions that involve synthesized contingencies (as determined by interview and observation). However, it is unknown whether synthesis of contingencies is necessary for determining a functional relation between problem behavior and environmental events. We extended Fisher, Greer, Romani, Zangrillo, and Owen (2016) and Slaton, Hanley, and Raferty (2017) by comparing the outcomes of FAs that involved isolated versus synthesized contingencies while controlling for other differences across the FAs for problem behavior of five young children. Next, we compared the effects of function-based interventions based on isolated and synthesized functional variables for each participant. Results showed that synthesized contingencies were not necessary to show functional relations between problem behavior and environmental events, and function-based treatments based on isolated contingencies were equally effective to those based on synthesized contingencies.