Behavioral Consultation

Abstract

Consultation is a form of service delivery that is gaining increased recognition in research, training, and practice. In consultation, two or more persons work together to address concerns regarding a third-party client. Of the several theoretical models of consultation described in the psychological and educational literature, behavioral consultation has received the greatest amount of research attention and some empirical support. Several reviews of the consultation literature have demonstrated that behavioral consultation has been effective in solving a variety of childhood problems (e.g., Gresham & Kendell, 1987; Martens, 1993). For example, this model has been demonstrated as effective with children exhibiting electively mute behavior (Piersel & Kratochwill, 1981; Sheridan, Kratochwill, & Ramirez, 1995), tics (Pray, Kramer, & Lindskog, 1986), social withdrawal (Sheridan, Kratochwill, & Elliott, 1990), academic and adjustment problems (Piersel & Kratochwill, 1979), and student underachievement (Galloway & Sheridan, 1994). The purposes of this chapter are to describe and define behavioral consultation, discuss its participants, and review the four basic stages of consultative problem solving. Readers are referred to the comprehensive texts by Bergan and Kratochwill (1990) and Kratochwill and Bergan (1990) for more extensive detail.