title: Early development of self-injurious behavior: an empirical study.
abstract: The early development of SIB in young children with developmental disabilities was examined by tracking over an 18-month period 16 school-age children who had recently started to show early SIB. Naturalistic observations were conducted in each child's classroom every 3 months, and the association between early SIB and environmental events was examined. Results showed that for the 4 children whose early SIB had escalated over this period, there was a significant association between early SIB and low levels of social contact across observation points, supporting models of the development of SIB. This association might be considered as a risk marker for the exacerbation of SIB. Implications of this finding for targeting early interventions for SIB are discussed.
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Birmingham, UK. s.s.hall@bham.ac.uk
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hall
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Oliver
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Murphy
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008607:Intellectual Disability; D008297:Male; D019370:Observation; D011582:Psychological Theory; D016728:Self-Injurious Behavior / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology*; D012720:Severity of Illness Index