The Practical Importance of the Distinction Between Open and Closed-Ended Indirect Assessments

Abstract

The identification of functional relations is a hallmark of applied behavior analysis. Building upon this foundation, applied behavior analysts have developed and researched a number of practices that fall within the purview of Functional Behavioral Assessment, a framework used to understand factors that influence a target behavior. Indeed, there now exists a wide range of procedures that fall within the purview of Functional Behavioral Assessment, with different procedures being associated with different strengths and limitations. Indirect assessments are commonly featured in most descriptions of the Functional Behavioral Assessment process. This paper focuses on the distinction between open and closed-ended indirect assessments specifically, highlighting their strengths and limitations. After distinguishing between these two types of indirect assessments considerations for practice are provided.

A Preliminary Evaluation of Interrater Reliability and Concurrent Validity of Open-Ended Indirect Assessment

“…First, the open-ended interview allowed the informant to describe qualitatively important information about the conditions and events that surround occurrences of problem behavior that cannot be easily gleaned from closed-ended interviews, and that this information could be explained in detail to each of the raters (e.g., Sally's father describing how he frequently called her through video chat). Fryling and Baires (2016) note that most closed-ended indirect assessments overlook potentially important context-specific factors that could affect the occurrence and maintenance of problem behavior. Second, the open-ended interview allowed the rater to gather a wide range of information about historical and current environmental influences on problem behavior, which may lead to a more informed hypothesis about the function of problem behavior.…”

“…Despite the consistent body of literature demonstrating the low to moderate reliability and validity of indirect assessments, they are considered a necessary component of the common FBA process and should continue to be improved on in future research. Moreover, indirect assessments are cost and time efficient, are used frequently by clinical behavior analysts, and represent the first step in a logical progression during FBA that proceeds from the least to the most intrusive assessment method (Fryling & Baires, 2016;Kelley et al, 2011). However, the use of successive indirect assessments in an attempt to determine a plausible hypothesis for the functions of problem behavior may ultimately be more time-consuming than simply conducting a single functional analysis.…”

“…One limitation of using closed-ended interviews during FBA, which might contribute to low reliability and validity scores, is that closed-ended interviews do not allow the interviewer to probe or ask clarifying questions about contextual factors, or allow the informant to provide qualitatively rich details that may be relevant to understanding the function of problem behavior. Given that FBA is an informationgathering process about environmental variables that might influence the occurrence or maintenance of problem behavior, some have questioned the utility of closed-ended interviews in practice (Fryling & Baires, 2016).…”

“…Specifically, the open-ended functional assessment interview presented by Hanley (2012) has been relied on as the primary indirect assessment that inspires research on interview-informed functional analyses. Openended interviews have a number of advantages over closedended interviews including allowing the behavior analyst to (a) derive information about contextual factors influencing problem behavior, (b) ask follow-up or probing questions relevant to what the informant has described, and (c) build positive rapport with the informant (Fryling & Baires, 2016). Although research in this area has been promising, the interrater reliability and concurrent validity of the open-ended interview described by Hanley (2012) is currently unknown and thus should be evaluated formally.…”

Ongoing, Explicit, and Direct Functional Assessment is a Necessary Component of ACT as Behavior Analysis: A Response to Tarbox et al. (2020)

“…However we also propose that direct observation of behavior is always an option for behavior analysts (and psychotherapists) when engaging in functional assessment, given that a behaving organism is invariably present and observable in any treatment scenario. Indirect assessment, although valuable and historically precedented, is clinically important to the extent it informs and/or supports a direct functional assessment of the behaviors observed, the relations among them, and the impact of the intervention (Cooper et al, 2019;Fryling & Baires, 2016;Hanley, 2012). For example, if an interview-an indirect assessment method often referenced by the authors-can be a useful component of a functional assessment, the speaking behavior observed during the interview should not only be considered in terms of its content (i.e., words spoken), but also its function (i.e., the antecedent and consequential conditions, and the learning history inherent therein) and its relationship with other directly observed behaviors.…”