The Effectiveness of Prevent-Teach-Reinforce: Does the Presence of Comorbid Internalizing Behavior Problems Moderate Outcomes for Children with Externalizing Behavior Problems?

This study examined the effectiveness of a school-based intervention process known as Prevent-Teach-Reinforce for children with a combination of externalizing and internalizing behaviors compared to children with only externalizing behaviors. The dependent variables examined were social skills, problem behaviors, and academic engaged time. Data for the current study were taken from archival data collected by the Florida Mental Health Institute that included students in kindergarten through 8th grade. A series of repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to identify differences in improvement on the dependent variables for the two groups of students. Research questions focused on the main effects as well as interaction effects between the type(s) of behavioral problems displayed (i.e., externalizing only, combination of externalizing and internalizing). Behavior problem classification was determined by calculating students\u27 individual subscale scores on the Social Skills Rating Scale. The current study found support for the use of the Prevent-Teach-Reinforce intervention for children with varying behavioral profiles. Significant improvements were found in social skills, behavioral problems, and academic engaged time for students. Additionally, results of this study indicate that internalizing behaviors did not serve as a moderator to treatment effectiveness for students with externalizing behavior problems who received the PTR intervention. That is, improvements were similar for both groups, demonstrating that PTR is a process that can be used in an equally-effective way for both populations