The Effectiveness of Behavioral Skills Training (BST) Program to Improve Personal Safety Skills for Down syndrome Adolescent with Mild Intellectual Disability

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the effectiveness of Behavioral Skills Training (BST) program in improving personal safety skills for a Down syndrome adolescent with mild intellectual disability. Personal safety is defined as an ability to recognize touch appropriateness, including four self-protective skills, consisting of resisting, removing, telling others, and reporting about any inappropriate touch she/he experiences. The single-subject design was administered in three days. The results show that the program was effective to improved subject’s personal safety skills and reached 97 % of the maximum score. The subject was able to master the skills of recognizing, resisting, removing and telling others with 100% score, while on the reporting skill, the obtained score was 83%. Rerunning the program, specifically with reporting skill as the target, has been recommended to improve reporting skill. Overall, to improve the effectiveness of the program, in situ training, training for trainers, and providing reinforcements are suggested.