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Behavioral observations are important to child assessment. Although parental reports of child behavior are useful, there is no substitute for the rich amount of information that can be gathered from watching children. Clinicians observe children in three ways (Greene & Ollendick, 2020). First, most clinicians observe children as they participate in the diagnostic interview. Clinicians might note children’s activity level, speech and language, emotional expressions, quality of interactions with parents, and other overt behavior. The shortcoming of informal observation is that children’s behavior in the clinic may not be representative of their behavior at home and school.

Second, many clinicians observe children performing analog tasks in the clinic. Analog tasks are designed to mimic real-life activities or situations. For example, a clinician might want to observe the interactions between a mother and her preschool-age child. The clinician might ask the dyad to play in the clinic playroom for 20 minutes. At the end of the play session, the clinician might ask the mother to tell the child to stop playing and to clean up the room. This analog task allows the clinician to observe firsthand how the mother issues commands to her child, how the child responds to her commands, and how the mother disciplines her child. Information gathered from analog observation can help the clinician understand how the pattern of interactions between parent and child might contribute to the child’s behavior problems.

Third, some clinicians conduct naturalistic observations. During math class, a school psychologist might monitor the activity level of a child suspected of having ADHD. The frequency of ADHD symptoms shown by the target child might be compared to the frequency of ADHD symptoms shown by other children in the class. The primary strength of naturalistic observation is that it permits clinicians to examine children’s behavior in everyday settings. The chief weakness of naturalistic observation is that it is time consuming. A second shortcoming of naturalistic observation is reactivity—that is, children might react to the fact that they are being observed and act in unnatural ways.

Figure 4.1 ■ Functional Analysis of Sara’s Behavior

Note: Functional analysis involves identifying the antecedents that elicit behavior problems and the consequences that maintain them over time. Based on Davison (2019).