A preliminary study into the relationship between emotional perception ability and challenging behaviour in adults with an intellectual disability

Assessment of Challenging Behavior Exhibited by People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: A Systematic Review

The assessment of challenging behavior exhibited by people with intellectual and developmental disabilities is essential for the planning of prevention and intervention programs. This review aimed to identify and analyze the standardized instruments that exclusively focus on the assessment of challenging behavior. We identified and organized 141 articles into four categories: original instrument studies, validation studies, relational studies, and intervention studies. The results identified 24 instruments that generally show high-quality psychometric properties and other utilities beyond the observation of the presence of challenging behavior and diagnostic categorization. Age, level of adaptive behavior, disability, presence of autism spectrum disorder, and medication are some of the variables that were found to be possibly related to the occurrence of challenging behavior. Additionally, the results suggest that interventions focused on supporting positive behavior or providing training on behavior to professionals and caregivers significantly reduced the occurrence of these behaviors. Instruments that help us to understand and measure the challenging behavior exhibited by people with intellectual and developmental disabilities are essential for the design of effective evaluation and intervention protocols.

The relationship between emotional recognition ability and challenging behaviour in adults with an intellectual disability: a systematic review

This review questions whether a relationship exists between emotional recognition ability and challenging behaviour in people with an intellectual disability. A search was completed of a number of databases to identify relevant articles, and these were then evaluated against defined criteria. Eight articles were reviewed and their aims, study methodology, samples, measurement tools and findings are discussed and evaluated. Overall, studies found no significant deficit in the emotional recognition abilities of those with challenging behaviour when they were asked to identify the emotions of others. Two areas for further investigation were identified. Firstly, to ascertain whether a bias for identifying anger or sadness is found in those with challenging behaviour, and secondly, to understand the role of context in recognition of emotions and the degree to which this is different in those who present with challenging behaviour. A critique relating to the research is provided and suggested clinical and research implications are put forward.