From ABA to SPR: 30 years developing evidence based services for the treatment and prevention of conduct disorder in Wales
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/17466661211238664 |
| Published date | 15 June 2012 |
| Date | 15 June 2012 |
| Pages | 101-112 |
| Author | Judy Hutchings |
| Subject Matter | Education,Health & social care,Sociology |
From ABA to SPR: 30 years developing
evidence based services for the treatment
and prevention of conduct disorder
in Wales
Judy Hutchings
Abstract
Purpose – This paper describes the author’s work during 35 years as a clinical psychologist in the NHS
in Wales working mainly with conduct disordered childrenand their families. It describe how from initially
working within an applied behaviour analysis (ABA) framework with individual families she subsequently
established and researched the group based Incredible Years(IY) parent programme in Wales and led
a Wales-wide dissemination of the IY programmes.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper provides a case study example of the use of the Society
for Prevention Research (SPR) criteria for translational research, that is research that can be applied
successfully in the real world.
Findings – Many of the challenges were overcome through the inclusion of strategies to maximise
effectiveness with differing populations, and by gaining the support of government and local services.
Originality/value – The paper discusses the challenges of taking an evidence-based programme
to scale.
Keywords Parenting interventions, Child conduct problems, Evidence-based programmes,
Implementation, Incredible years, Children (age groups),United Kingdom, Problem families, Social care
Paper type Case study
Introduction
As an undergraduate in the 1960s, it was exciting to learn about Skinner’s (1938) laboratory-
based animal experimentation, his identification of the principles and schedules of
reinforcement and their potential applications to human behaviour (Skinner, 1948, 1971).
Things moved quickly and by the 1960s behaviour analysts were undertaking a variety of
experimental work with humans, initially in laboratory studies of human responses to varying
schedules of reinforcement (Ayllon and Azrin, 1965). Increasingly, the principles were used
in applied settings to achieve clinical benefits. The early therapeutic work was with the most
marginalised, generally institutionalised, populations (Lloyd and Garlington, 1968). In the
1960s and 1970s, many children with significant developmental difficulties lived in hospitals
and early applied work with children was also generally undertaken with institutionalised
children (Lovaas et al., 1965; Wolf et al., 1964).
Social learning theory researchers, working with non-clinical populations also influenced
clinical practice, demonstrating how children learned by imitation and how, if reinforced, the
imitated behaviour would generalise to new situations (Miller and Dollard, 1941). Exposure to
aggressive film or models was shown to increase children’s aggressive behaviour
(Bandura et al., 1961; Lovaas, 1961).
DOI 10.1108/17466661211238664 VOL. 7 NO. 2 2012, pp. 101-112, QEmerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 1746-6660
j
JOURNAL OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES
j
PAGE 101
Judy Hutchings is based at
the Centre for Evidence
Based Early Intervention,
Bangor University,
Bangor, UK.
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