Florida Administrative Code › 65 - DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND FAMILIES › 65G - Agency for Persons with Disabilities › Chapter 65G-4 - SERVICE DELIVERY PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE › Section 65G-4.001 - Definitions for Behavior Services: Practice and Procedure

Current through Reg. 50, No. 138; July 16, 2024
(1) Area Behavior Analyst means a behavior
				analyst employed by, or under contract with an area office of the Agency who
				holds a doctorate from an accredited university program with behavior analysis
				as a primary focus, is a board certified behavior analyst, has completed a
				dissertation that had behavior analysis as its central focus and has at least
				one year of experience in the provision of behavior analysis services for
				persons with developmental disabilities. However, if no one with these
				qualifications is available, then the individual must be a certified behavior
				analyst with at least the education and experience requirements for taking the
				board's behavior analyst examination.
(2) Behavior analysis refers to the use of
				scientific methods to produce socially significant improvements in behavior.
				This process entails gathering information to analyze or describe the link
				between behavior and environment. It includes assessment of the environment and
				consequences that are maintaining the behavior targeted for change. It also
				encompasses changing the situations in the environment that trigger problem
				behavior and arranging situations that will provide the opportunity for
				desirable behaviors to occur. Behavior Analysis interventions teach or increase
				occurrence of skills to replace the behavior targeted for change and arrange
				delivery of consequences for desirable and undesirable behavior. A behavior
				analytic intervention also includes strategies and approaches to maintain the
				gains of the intervention over time and in varied settings. Behavior change
				interventions are based on the principles and laws of behavior. Behavior
				analytic interventions require monitoring and evaluation for effectiveness
				through direct observation and quantification of the behavior targeted for
				change. Caregivers and family members are actively involved in the behavior
				analysis process and are taught how to implement specific techniques or changes
				in the environment. Behavior analysis does not rely on cognitive therapies and
				expressly excludes psychological testing, neuropsychology, psychotherapy, sex
				therapy, physchoanalysis, hypnotherapy and long term counseling as treatment
				modalities.
(3) Behavior analysis
				services - The use of behavior analysis to assist a person or persons to learn
				new behavior, to increase existing behavior, to reduce existing behavior, and
				to emit behavior under precise environmental conditions. The term "behavior
				analysis services" includes the terms "behavior analysis service plan, "
				"behavioral programming, " "behavioral supports, " "behavior modification
				programs, " "behavior intervention plans, " "behavior plans, " and "behavioral
				programs, " as well as those interventions designed to ameliorate dangerous
				behavior as described in subsection
				 65G-4.010(3),
				F.A.C., below. These services are supported in documentation showing that they
				are applied, behavioral, analytic, technological, conceptually systematic, and
				effective relative to the definitions of these terms found in "Some Current
				Dimensions of Applied Behavior Analysis" by D. M. Baer, M. M. Wolf, and T. R.
				Risley and available in the
Journal of Applied Behavior
				Analysis
, Volume 1, 1968. This article is incorporated by reference
				and may be found online at
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1310980/pdf/jaba00083-0089.pdf
.
(4) Certification Body - A nonprofit
				corporation whose standards for certification of behavior analysts and
				assistant behavior analysts adheres to the national standards of boards that
				determine professional credentials to meet the needs of behavior analysts,
				state governments and consumers of behavior analysis services. The
				certification procedure of the nonprofit corporation must undergo regular
				psychometric review and validation pursuant to a job analysis survey of the
				profession and standards established by content experts in the field.
(5) Certified Behavior Analyst - A behavior
				analyst certified by a certification body, including a Board Certified Behavior
				Analyst - Doctoral level, a Board Certified Behavior Analyst, a Board Certified
				Assistant Behavior Analyst and a Florida Certified Behavior Analyst.
(6) Consultation - Monthly contacts between a
				Board Certified Assistant Behavior Analyst (BCaBA) and a consulting Board
				Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA), during which the behavior analysis services
				provided by the BCaBA are evaluated. At the time consultation is provided, the
				consulting BCBA shall not be the BCaBA's subordinate, employee, spouse or
				family member. The consulting BCBA shall not be considered an employee of the
				BCaBA if the only compensation received by the consulting BCBA consists of
				payment for consultation. Monthly contacts may include the BCaBA's presentation
				of behavior analysis services designed by the BCaBA, with a focus on graphic
				displays of data, at local review committee meetings, established in Rule
				 65G-4.008, F.A.C.
(7) Contingent exercise - Bodily exertion or
				effort that is not topographically related to the misbehavior, involving a
				repeated series of physical movements required as a consequence for
				inappropriate behavior.
(8)
				Desensitization - A method for teaching an individual to exhibit calm or
				incompatible behavior during the gradual and systematic presentation of
				increasing levels of an aversive or feared stimulus resulting in the ability to
				tolerate the formerly feared stimulus.
(9) Dietary manipulations - Procedures
				involving the alteration of dietary variables including the quantity or type of
				food eaten and liquids consumed, the caloric density of the diet, the oral
				stimulation involved in eating, and the temporal distribution of the daily
				diet.
(10) Extinction - A procedure
				in which reinforcement of a previously reinforced behavior is
				discontinued.
(11) Facility - Can
				be a publicly or privately established residential operation serving
				individuals with behavioral service needs.
(12) Functional Communication Training (FCT)
				- a procedure in which a functional form of communication is taught and
				reinforcement is provided contingent upon communication, while withholding
				reinforcement for other behavior.
(13) Positive practice overcorrection -
				Activities that involve repeated performance of a desirable alternative
				behavior related to a targeted inappropriate behavior.
(14) Provider - An enrolled professional
				authorized to provide behavior analysis services. Only individuals who are
				board certified behavior analysts - doctoral level, board certified behavior
				analysts (BCBA), board certified assistant behavior analysts (BCaBA), Florida
				certified behavior analysts or persons licensed in accordance with Chapter 490
				or 491, F.S., on active status, and demonstrating supervision as required, may
				be providers of behavior analysis services. Only those providers holding a
				certificate on active status from a recognized certification organization for
				behavior analysis shall use the title, "certified behavior analyst."
				Individuals performing behavior analysis services shall limit their practice to
				areas of documented expertise and in accordance with their education, training,
				and certification or licensure, unless otherwise demonstrating evidence of
				supervision by an individual meeting the requisite education, training, and
				certification.
(15) Regular
				psychometric review and validation - A certification process which complies
				with recognized national standards in the testing and certification industry to
				ensure the certification examinations are fair, valid and reliable and in
				conformance with recognized standards such as those of the International
				Organization for Standardization (ISO) or the National Commission for
				Certifying Agencies (NCCA).
(16)
				Response blocking - The use of physical intervention upon occurrence of an
				undesirable behavior in such a way as to interrupt the normal form of
				responding.
(17) Response cost - A
				procedure in which a specified amount of available reinforcers are removed from
				the individual's reserve upon occurrence of a specified behavior.
(18) Restitutional overcorrection -
				Activities that involve correcting the effects of a specified behavior to a
				better condition than present prior to the occurrence of the specified
				behavior.
(19) Time-out - These
				procedures include the withdrawal of the opportunity to earn positive
				reinforcement or the loss of access to positive reinforcers for a specified
				period of time.
(20) Token Economy
				- A behavior change system in which identified behaviors are reinforced by a
				symbolic medium of exchange, or token, which is later used by a participant in
				the "purchase" of backup reinforcers, including objects or
				activities.
Rulemaking Authority 393.13(4)(g)3.,
					 393.17 FS. Law Implemented
					 393.13(4)(g)3., 393.17
					 FS.
New 9-23-96, Formerly 10F-4.023,
					  65B-4.023, Amended
					 4-4-12.