Carer reports of the efficacy of cognitive behavioral interventions for anger.
Group CBI lowers carer-reported aggression in adults with ID, especially when carers join and frame behavior as emotional.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Rose (2010) ran a group CBI anger program for adults with intellectual disability.
Some groups included carers; others did not. Carers then rated client aggression before and after.
The study compared these ratings to a wait-list group to see if anger-related aggression dropped.
What they found
Carers saw clear cuts in aggressive acts after the group CBI.
The drop was largest when carers also attended sessions and viewed behavior as driven by emotion.
How this fits with other research
Sofronoff et al. (2007) found the same positive pattern in children with Asperger syndrome. Their short clinic CBT also lowered parent-reported anger episodes, showing the idea works across ages.
Howlin et al. (2006) used group CBT with adults with ID earlier, but aimed at depression, not anger. Both studies show adults with ID can gain from manualized group CBT, extending the tool to new targets.
Edwards et al. (2007) taught mindfulness instead of CBI and still cut aggression in adults with ID. The shared outcome suggests different self-management paths can reach the same goal.
Why it matters
You can add a weekly CBI anger group to adult ID services. Invite carers and teach them to see behavior as emotion, not defiance. This small shift may give you the biggest drop in aggression without extra meds or restraint.
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Ask each client’s carer to sit in on the next anger group and label outbursts as ‘feeling mad’ before logging them.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Anger resulting in Aggression can be a significant problem for some people with Intellectual Disabilities. Carers were asked to complete a provocation inventory and an attribution scale before and after a group cognitive behavioral intervention aimed for anger and at similar points in time for a waiting list control. When compared using an analysis of variance results suggest that staff perceive a significant reduction in aggressive responses for participants who took part in the intervention. A regression analysis of factors that may influence the amount of change observed suggests that greater change was achieved if participants were accompanied by carers and had been attributed by carers as having an emotional cause for their behavior.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2010 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2010.06.007