Behavioral Consultation as a Process for Linking the Assessment and Treatment of Social Skills

There has been recent interest in social skills assessment and treatment among researchers and practitioners. The research bases in these areas are expanding rapidly, and the identification of valid assessment methods and effective intervention strategies is promising. However, few researchers have identified ways in which social skills assessment and intervention can be linked in a practical manner. Likewise, the process by which services are delivered is rarely addressed. The purpose of this article is to present a model by which the interaction between social skills assessment and intervention can be enhanced, with a focus on the problem-solving process. One effective and efficient manner of providing services to socially unskilled children is through an indirect model of service delivery; that of behavioral consultation. Behavioral consultation is a four-stage problem-solving model that involves the cooperative efforts of two or more persons to clarify a student's needs and develop and implement appropriate strategies for intervention. This article presents the objectives and procedures of each stage of behavioral consultation as a process to facilitate accurate problem identification and effective problem resolution, with the goal of linking social skills assessment directly to treatment.