None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
The study aims to understand whether Active Support a quality-of-life staff training programme has the potential for preventing challenging behaviour (e.g., aggression, self-injury and destructive behaviour) in adults with IDD living in residential living settings. The study will involve training support staff in Active Support aligned strategies that are anticipated to prevent challenging behaviours. These strategies will include staff planning for activities, providing choices, supporting residents to engage in chosen activities and providing positive social attention. The researcher will observe the effects of the training on staff and the residents they support. The study will seek to understand whether the strategies are more effective for some individuals than others and will use some behavioural assessments and questionnaires to understand the individual characteristics of residents. Social validity data will also be gathered to understand how the strategies are perceived and experienced by both staff and residents.
Interventions
The study aims to explore the effects of Active Support staff training strategies on engagement and challenging behaviour (aggressive, self-injurious, destructive or significantly disruptive behaviours) in adults with Intellectual or Developmental Disabilities (IDD) and high support needs.
Key Active Support strategies that are theoretically aligned with reducing the likelihood of challenging behaviours will be taught to support staff in residential living settings. These will include:
1) Plan
The study aims to explore the effects of Active Support staff training strategies on engagement and challenging behaviour (aggressive, self-injurious, destructive or significantly disruptive behaviours) in adults with Intellectual or Developmental Disabilities (IDD) and high support needs. Key Active Support strategies that are theoretically aligned with reducing the likelihood of challenging behaviours will be taught to support staff in residential living settings. These will include: 1) Planning activities 2) Provision of choice 3) Providing appropriate levels of support to the adult with IDD to engage in a chosen activity 4) Providing positive social attention during engagement Training will be delivered face-to-face by the researcher in line with following features of a Behaviour Skills Training protocol: a) Short PowerPoints b) Written information c) Verbal explanations d) Demonstrations e) Roleplay f) Feedback There will be approximately seven, 40-minute, one-on-one training sessions per staff member. They will be scheduled for convenience over approximately 2-3 weeks. The training phase will continue until the staff member has completed 7 training sessions, and staff are able to use all the strategies with 100% fidelity. Fidelity will be checked in a role play context in sessions 4 and 5. Targeted booster sessions will be used if needed. The fidelity of training delivery will also be monitored by an additional researcher for at least 30% of training sessions. The intervention observation phase will occur immediately after staff have completed the 2-3 week training phase. Timing will vary in terms of participants beginning the intervention phase due to the staggered delivery of concurrent multiple baseline design. It is expected that participants will begin the intervention phase between 1-6 weeks after beginning the baseline phase.
Sponsors
Sophia Kennedy
Study design
Allocation
Non-randomised trial
Intervention model
Other
Primary purpose
Prevention
Masking
Open (masking not used)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
Dyads consisting of one resident participant and one respective staff member Resident participants: (a) adults 18 years or older (b) have a diagnosis of IDD and high levels of support need to be identified through the Supports Intensity Scale- Adult (SIS-A; Thompson et al., 2015) (c) living in a residential care setting (d) engaging in challenging behaviour that is negatively impacting the quality of life of the individual according to the Challenging Behaviour Interview (CBI; Oliver et al., 2003) (e) not be currently receiving a formal behavioural intervention in addition to the organisations behaviour management plan. Staff participants: (a) regularly working with a resident that meets the above criteria (b) expecting to continue working with this resident at least for the duration of the study.
Exclusion criteria
If the resident is actively receiving a formal behavioural intervention at the time of recruitment, they will be excluded from the study as a) intervention strategies may have the potential for conflict, b) changes in residents’ behaviour will not be clearly attributable to the current study or the formal behaviour intervention, posing challenges for both parties. However, given long waitlists for behaviour intervention services in New Zealand, participants may be on the waitlist for services and will not be discouraged from seeking these services participation. Staff members will be excluded if they are expecting to leave their role working with the resident during the study's duration. This will maximise the likelihood of the intervention having full effect.
Outcome results
None listed