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Behavioural Modification
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Traditionally behaviour modification has looked at the ways in which the social and physical environment influences people’s behaviour by reinforcing it. In situations where staff have control over individual’s environments such as residential institutions, the environment has been altered to achieve desired behaviour on the part of residents/patients, e.g. in "token economies" clients can earn points as rewards for desired behaviour, which can be traded in for extra privileges.
A more modern approach is to use the principles of reinforcement to identify what a person may be gaining from a problem behaviour, i.e. what function is a behaviour fulfilling for an individual. This is done by carrying out a functional analysis and recording the behaviour, what happened just before it (antecedents) and what happened just after it (consequences). This is often termed the ABC approach. If the function of a behaviour is identified it will often point to a need which the person has which, may then be fulfilled in an alternative way so that the problem behaviour is no longer needed. Exactly the same process can be used to identify the function of any behaviour which is troubling an individual, and to identify what is reinforcing it.
In its simplest and most traditional form behaviour modification is potentially open to abuse and should be used only with caution. In its more modern form this use of Operant Conditioning Theory is often referred to as Applied Behaviour Analysis and has considerable potential to contribute to the understanding of a wide range of psychological difficulties and to generate creative therapeutic approaches to change.
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