RBT Behavior Assessment Study Guide

Your role in assessment

RBTs assist with assessment. You collect the data your supervisor specifies, administer the portions you are assigned, and report accurately. You do not select instruments, interpret results, determine function, decide when assessment is complete, or answer questions about diagnosis and prognosis.

A large share of Domain B items are scenario questions where a parent or teacher asks the RBT something that sounds harmless — "is his autism severe?", "what do you think is causing this?" — and the correct answer is always to redirect warmly to the supervisor without offering an opinion.

Preference assessments

A preference assessment identifies what is *likely* to function as a reinforcer. Whether something actually is a reinforcer is determined by its effect on behavior, not by the assessment. Preferences shift quickly, which is why many programs run one before each session.

Free operant

The client has open access to an array; you record duration of engagement with each item. No items are removed, which makes it the right choice for a client who becomes distressed when things are taken away.

Single stimulus

One item presented at a time; you record approach or engagement. Useful for clients who cannot yet choose between options.

Paired stimulus (forced choice)

Two items at a time, working through every possible pair. With n items the number of unique pairs is n × (n − 1) ÷ 2 — so four items gives six pairings.

MSWO

Multiple stimulus without replacement. Present an array, remove the selected item, re-present the smaller array. The order of selection produces a ranked hierarchy.

MSWR / MSW

Multiple stimulus with replacement. The selected item is returned to the array each trial, so array size stays constant.

Functional assessment and the four functions

Behavior is commonly described as maintained by attention, escape or avoidance, access to tangibles, or automatic reinforcement. The same topography can serve different functions in different people and different contexts, which is why intervention must follow assessment rather than appearance.

Descriptive (ABC) assessment records what happened immediately before the behavior, the behavior itself, and what happened immediately after. Because nothing is manipulated, it can only show correlation. A functional analysis manipulates conditions systematically — attention, demand, alone, and a play or control condition — and is the only method that demonstrates a causal relationship. RBTs assist with both under supervision.

Motivating operations

A motivating operation momentarily changes how valuable a consequence is, and correspondingly changes behavior that has produced it. Deprivation is an establishing operation: it raises value. Satiation is an abolishing operation: it lowers value.

Exam items typically describe a client who worked hard for a reinforcer earlier and now will not, or who suddenly works much harder at the end of a session. Both are MO questions. The trap answer is usually "extinction", which describes withholding the reinforcer — a different thing entirely from the reinforcer losing its value.