Pilot Study
Wendy L. Siegel, A.B.D.; Jane Y. Murdock, Ph.D.; and April D. Colley, M.Ed. (paper presented March 13, 1997 at the 17th annual Super Conference in Baton Rouge, LA)
Dealing with aggressive, noncompliant behaviors is an ever increasing concern for teachers today, particularly for teachers of students with behavior disorders. While a number of programs exist to control students' classroom behaviors, few have succeeded in making long term changes in behavior that generalize to settings where the programs are not in operation. It is possible that generalization may be achieved through changing students' self-concepts by providing them with new, more positive roles. If students perceive themselves as having socially acceptable roles, it is possible that they may naturally change their behaviors to be in accordance with those roles.
Students participated in separate daily 45 minute sessions learning how to train a service dog. Sessions were one-on-one, with one instructor, one student, and one dog participating. The same instructor and the same dog worked with each student. Target behaviors included aggressive and uncooperative behaviors.
Data for the female student revealed a 53% drop in her target behaviors from baseline to intervention data. Data for the participating male student showed a 67% drop in his target behaviors from baseline to intervention data. The target behaviors of the student who did not participate in dog training sessions remained consistently high. These findings suggest that learning to train a dog can effectively reduce the aggressive/uncooperative classroom behaviors of students with behavior disorders.
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