Avaliação e tratamento da inabilidade de estudantes para falar em público

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the control exercised by antecedent and consequent events that controlled the behavior of inability to speak in public of two students, one female, 17 years old, and the other male, 15 years old. For evaluation, the functional assessment process was used by indirect observation, in which the functional evaluation interview was applied, direct observation of its behavior at various moments in the institution and functional (experimental) analysis. The functional analysis involved the manipulation of environmental events in four main conditions: attention, demand, alone and control. The attention condition was subdivided into: (1) attention-exhortation, (2) attention-direct eyeto- eye contact, and (3) attention-disapproval for P1, and for P2 Eye to eye, (2) attentionexhortation, and (3) attention-contrast. The results showed that for the two participants there was a greater register of problem behaviors in the attention conditions and their subconditions and demand, in comparison to the conditions alone and control. These results demonstrate that these behaviors were maintained by sources of positive and negative reinforcement in both cases. The objective of this study was to treat participants' problem behaviors. Treatment with the use of verbal instruction modeling was used and, after differential reinforcement of alternative behaviors combined with extinction, it was possible to reduce inappropriate behaviors and to increase appropriate behaviors. For the control of the procedures was used the design of alternate treatments of the ABC type followed by follow-up. As a result of treatment there was a significant reduction in the frequency of inappropriate behaviors in both techniques employed and in both participants, in addition to increasing the frequency of appropriate behaviors. It was possible to reach the objectives of this study, proving, as well as in others existing in the literature, that through the application of behavioral analysis strategies, it becomes possible to increase the frequency of appropriate behaviors in adolescents who are inability to speak in public.