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11 SEPTEMBER 2009
NO 1486
The child's perspective
"Having to be in placement is like being in Hell." This child's summary of his subjective experience of group care (Anonymous, cited in VanderVen, 1993) may very well be more typical than not. Children in out-of-home care often view themselves as powerless victims in a world run by and for adults. If fair rules and benign consequences are seen by youngsters as arbitrary and repressive, certainly we shouldn't be surprised when group care residents perceive the point and level systems described by VanderVen (1993) as deplorable or worse.
The limitations of point and level systems as currently applied in residential care settings have been catalogued by many authors (e.g., Armstrong, 1993; Buckholdt and Gubrium, 1980; Durrant, 1993; Fox, 1994; Goldfried and Castonguay, 1993; VanderVen, 1993; VanderVen, 1995). It is clear that a misapplication of behavior management techniques accounts for many of the shortcomings. I believe, however, that many other difficulties arise from the limitations of the underlying theory itself, which concentrates exclusively on observable behaviors and their consequences.
One of the major problems of these point systems and the reinforcement theory on which they are based is disregard for "their symbolic meaning: What they implicitly not just explicitly, communicate to children and youth about adults and the environments these adults devise" (VanderVen, 1995, p. 350). Staff need to consider the meaning of these interventions not only from the perspective of experts or practitioners, but also from the perspective of the children and youth in care. It is the child's reality that counts.
Placing primary importance on the child's interpretation of the situation, rather than the practitioner's preconceived notions, requires a paradigm shift. A paradigm is a conceptual framework that organizes our understanding of phenomena. Although a paradigm doesn't necessarily answer important questions, it tells us where to look. Where we look largely determines the answer we'll find.
In this article I begin by exploring how reinforcement theory is misapplied in residential group care and how it might be more effective if used correctly. Next I briefly review alternate theories of human behavior that take into consideration the importance of differences in perspective and perceptions between staff and the children in care. I offer suggestions for other kinds of interventions, based on these new paradigm theories, that might be used to supplement or replace the behavioral techniques customarily employed in residential group care. Not all of the alternative approaches I suggest will be new to readers. (Some of them, in fact, are already incorporated into the behavior management routines of many group care settings.) They include "active ignoring," modeling, cooperative incentive structures, natural and logical consequences, empowerment through use of group processes, restitution, and reaffirmation training. The point I'm making is that the underlying theme that unifies all of them is the importance accorded the perspectives of the children and youth in care.
MIRIAM MCNOWN JOHNSON
Johnson, M.M. (1999). Managaing perceptions: A new
paradigm for residential group care. Child and Youth Care Forum, 28,
3. pp. 165-166.
REFERENCES
Armstrong, L. (1993). And they call it help. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Buckholdt, D. R. and Gubrium, J. F. (1980). The underlife of behavior modification. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 50. pp. 279-290.
Durrant, M. (1993). Residential treatment: A cooperative, competency-based approach to therapy and program design. New York: W W Norton & Company.
Fox, L. E. (1994). The catastrophe of compliance. Journal of Child and Youth Care, 9. pp. 13-21.
Goldfried, M. R. and Castonguay, L. G. (1993). Behavior therapy: Redefining strengths and limitations. Behavior Therapy, 24. pp. 505-506.
VanderVen, K. (1993). Point and level systems: Do they have a place in the group care milieu? R & E: Research and Evaluation in Group Care, 3. pp. 20-23.
VanderVen, K. (1995). "Point and level systems": Another way to fail children and youth. Child and Youth Care Forum, 24. pp. 345-367.
