Objective
The use of psychotropic medication to address challenging behavior in individuals diagnosed with intellectual disabilities is common practice; however, very few studies have examined how multiple medication use (or combination treatment) impacts the behaviors these medications are prescribed to treat.
Method
The current study followed eight individuals over a two-year period as they experienced changes in their psychotropic medication regimens. During that time, data from functional analyses and indirect assessments of challenging behavior were collected.
Results
The results suggest that changes in psychotropic medication regimens can produce changes in functional assessment outcomes, suggesting a need for continued behavioral assessment to better inform medication practices and behavioral treatment. Of the eight participants in the study, five participants’ behaviors varied in rate of responding in FAs across all medication changes. Additionally, three participants’ FAs produced changes in outcomes; however, those changes were not consistent across all medication changes, that is, not every medication change yielded different outcomes from previous assessments.
Conclusion
This study demonstrates how the outcome of an FA can be used to monitor the effects of psychotropic medication changes, specifically when medications are combined, on challenging behavior in individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.