Causal Factors Regarding Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders - Essay Example

? Insert Insert Insert 18 January Causal Factors Regarding with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders Introduction There exists no precise definition for emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD). However, emotional and behavioral encompasses various characteristics attributable to certain aspects of the individual and as displayed by students. For instance, the inability to learn, build and maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships constitutes an aspect of emotional and behavioral disorders. In addition, students with emotional and behavioral disorders display feelings and behaviors that would be considered inappropriate under normal life circumstances (Merrell & Walker, 2004). This paper seeks to discuss casual factors, their implications and possible mitigation regarding students with emotional and behavioral disorders in relation to biological, family, school and cultural contexts. How to identify causal factors of EBD Emotional and behavioral disorders may exist at the same time with other disabilities within an individual student. From the biological domain, there exist certain factors that could cause emotional and behavioral disorders. These may include affective disorders, schizophrenic disorders, anxiety disorders or any other persistent conduct maladjustments that undesirably affect educational outcomes of the student. These could be identified through self-directed and over controlled emotional and behavioral factors such as somatic problems, anxiety, social withdrawal or isolation and depression (Merrell & Walker, 2004). Within the school context, disruption, noncompliance and aggression constitute factors that could cause emotional and behavioral disorders in students. These may be identified through lack of focused attention, continued disruption of other students, isolation and avoidance or escaping demands of class work and assignments. These students may also not carry out tasks and assignments as expected of them. From the context of the family, health factors, physical symptoms and pervasive mood constitute causal factors of emotional and behavioral disorders. Poor health status, depression, unhappiness remain identifiable features of these causal factors. Furthermore, social isolation, comprise the cultural context. These causal factors would be identified through the inability of these students to build and maintain acceptable interpersonal relationship with others. In addition, they have fear, engage in antisocial and deviant behaviors, lack remorse and select or develop their own set of behavioral rules that govern their conduct (Merrell & Walker, 2004). Criteria of identifying causal factors in EBD Several methods have become suggested by different researchers of emotional and behavioral disorders as applicable to the identification of the factors causing the disability. In this regard, the use of the Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) technique would be appropriate in identifying these causal factors in students. The use of this technique involves the identification of the relationship between causes and effects in relation to a specific behavior and environmental incidents. Applied Behavior Analysis technique also takes into account other characteristics that could be put into consideration while identifying causal factors. Such characteristics include the ability of behavior to be learnt, changed and be influenced by environmental consequences. Moreover, the technique focuses on the behavior rather than the disability and entails the use of game plans in changing behavior. The use of behavioral principles, behavior change measurement and exclusion of emotional relations as underlying cause also forms part of the criteria employed in Applied Behavior Analysis technique (Yell et al., 2009). Impacts of causal factors on students with EBD The characteristics of behavior may be determined by their outcomes on behavior. Causal factors that remain as unconditional or conditioned have considerable impacts on the behavior of students with emotional and behavioral disorders. Also worth noting would be that impacts remain variable and individualized. Furthermore, the value of the behavior outcomes would be dependent on the magnitude or extent of the causal factors. Some impacts of causal factors include becoming antisocial, the development of symptoms such as fear, and the inability to learn in school. Moreover, they willfully engage in antisocial and undesirable behaviors as well as join and participate in antisocial group activities within their social networks. In addition, they shift blames for their mistakes, become annoyed easily and often become resentful, angry or lose temper. They exhibit lack of attention, depression, neglect, aggression and oppositional behaviors (Merrell & Walker, 2004). Mitigation of causal factors Mitigation could take the form of reinforcement which could either be conditioned or unconditioned. Unconditioned reinforcers have biological impacts and remain essential for survival. On the other hand, the use of tokens and attention would constitute conditioned reinforcers and should be paired with unconditioned reinforcers. In mitigating causal factors, certain factors of the reinforcers should be considered such as deprivation, satiation, schedule, immediacy and reliability. Mitigation possibilities should be individualized and use various forms since the characteristics of the consequence depends on the individual student with emotional and behavioral disorders (Yell at al., 2009). Reinforcement schedules need to be implemented that would likely produce positive behavioral outcomes in students with emotional and behavioral disorders. These schedules would take into account behaviors and emotions of the students as well as the biological, family, school and cultural factors underlying the causal factors. The choice of reinforcement should increase the chances of future manifestation of the behavior. Also, reinforcement should be administered immediately the behavior occurs and be reliant on the behavior. During the early phases of learning, reinforcement should be administered more frequently and be reduced as the student acquires more proficiency on the skill (Yell et al., 2009). Behavioral principles of punishment and extinction may also be applied in mitigating causal factors. Punishment could either be positive or negative. Positive punishment could make use of aversive stimuli like loud noise and verbal reprimands whereas negative punishment could make use of response cost procedures such as tokens and time out from reinforcement. Extinction entails prevention, termination or withdrawal of the access to the causal factors that maintained the behavior. In addition, the qualities of the punisher such as scolding ought to be considered. The use of various punishers would facilitate their effectiveness, however, their effectiveness declines over time. Finally, reinforcement of alternative desirable behaviors could be employed in mitigating undesirable behaviors in students with emotional and behavioral disorders (Yell et al., 2009). Recommendations A precise and comprehensive definition of the term ‘emotional and behavioral disorder’ needs also to be acted upon by the federal government. The government also needs to design and implement appropriate considerations to cater for the needs of students with emotional and behavioral disorders like students with other disabilities. In addition, the actions of students with emotional and behavioral disorders needs to be comprehensively assessed before any legal action may be taken on them. Their education system needs to be strengthened and harmonized to meet their educational needs and shape them to become socially upright and productive members of the society. Laws prohibiting discrimination of such students should be enacted and enforced to govern against any disregard or discrimination directed towards these students. Appropriate mental health services should be made available to students with emotional and behavioral disorders. Moreover, the causal factors need to be prevented or eliminated, and varied applicable mitigation measures developed to help manage the existing situation. Conclusion There exist varied causal factors to the development of emotional and behavioral disorders in students. These causal factors manifest themselves in various ways in each student and the impact of their consequences remains dependent on the specific student. Causal factors could take the biological, family, school and cultural context in relation to causative factors and their identification. The use of Applied Behavior Analysis could be used to identify causal factors in students with emotional and behavioral disorders using predefined criteria. The impacts of these causal factors range from antisocial behaviors to inability to learn at school. Furthermore, students with emotional and behavioral disorders neither build nor maintain acceptable interpersonal relationships with fellow students, teachers and other people in society. In this regard, the use of possible mitigating measures could help enhance steps in reconstructing emotional and behavioral disorders in students. Such mitigating measures would comprise of reinforcement, punishment, extinction and alternative desirable behaviors. In employing mitigating measures, reinforcement schedules, principles, immediacy, satiation, deprivation and reliability constitute the factors that need to be considered. Lastly, further research should be conducted to seek varied and possible applicable mitigation measures for managing students with emotional and behavioral disorders. References Merrell, K. W. & Walker, H. M. (2004). Deconstructing a Definition: Social Maladjustment versus Emotional Disturbance and Moving the EBD Field Forward. Psychology in the Schools, 41(8), 899-910. Yell, M. L., Meadows, N. B., Drasgow, E & Shriner, J. G. (2009). Evidence-Based Practices for Educating Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (ISBN: 0-558-16275-4), 64-72. Read More