Malgré l'utilisation répandue de différentes techniques de modification du comportement auprès de personnes ayant une déficience intellectuelle et ce, dans un but d'apprentissage de nouvelles habiletés ainsi que de la réduction de comportements inadéquats ou excessifs, plusieurs intervenants travaillant sur une base quotidienne auprès de ces personnes rencontrent des difficultés dans l'application systématique de ces techniques. Ce document offre certaines définitions de ce que sont les troubles du comportement pour des individus ayant une déficience intellectuelle et des troubles de l'apprentissage importants et décrit certaines stratégies d'intervention utilisant une combinaison de certaines techniques behaviorales reconnues et de certaines approches écologiques novatrices.

This is a timely book. The question of how to help people with challenging behaviour -and how to design and manage services so that staff, families and users feel that what should be done is being done - is at the top of the agenda. Failure to deal com petently with the issue results in disaffection, poor quality ser vices and a less than optimal quality of life for service users. Moreover, the credibility of services for all people with learning disabilities is intimately connected with how we cope with chal lenging behaviour, a point made recently by a Department of Health Working Group chaired by Jim Mansell (Department of Health, 1993). The book is welcome because it draws together what is known about the important questions from a British perspective, although, of course, most of the underlying issues have world wide relevance. The contributors, while all having a good deal of experience and authority, do not put forward simple portrayals of the problems, nor glib solutions, and this is one of the book's major strengths. Clarity in the field of challenging behaviour is sometimes elu sive. What is presented here forces the reader to confront argu ments in a rational and logical fashion.

First published in 1994. This book is a practical guide for those involved in the daily care, education and development of people with learning disabilities and additional behavioural and emotional disturbances. It will assist professional helpers in understanding the nature of an individual’s difficulties and in developing interventions aimed at alleviating them.

This is a thoroughly revised, expanded and updated new edition, giving a comprehensive, cross-disciplinary overview of challenging behaviour.