Excerpted from chapter 7 of Communication-Based Intervention for Problem Behavior: A User's Guide for Producing Positive Change, by Edward G. Carr, Ph.D., Len Levin, M.A., Gene McConnachie, Ph.D., Jane I. Carlson, M.A., Duane C. Kemp, Ph.D., & Christopher E. Smith, M.A.
Copyright © 1994 by Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

If you associate yourself repeatedly with a wide variety of activities, people, and things that the person values, then eventually your presence will become a signal that many rewarding activities and events are available with you. (In technical terms, your presence becomes a “generalized reinforcer.”) The purpose of associating yourself with positive experiences is to begin reversing any hostility or indifference that the person with disabilities may feel toward you. In time, that person will view you as someone worth attending to and interacting with.

Example: Val

At first, Val had a poor relationship with Joan. Sometimes, Joan would angrily tell Val to stop spitting and cursing. Also, when Val hit others or grabbed someone’s hair, Joan and her aides would have to restrain Val momentarily for protection. Because Val did not like to be held in this manner, she frequently became angrier and even more aggressive toward Joan. Over time, Joan became a person Val tried to avoid. To remedy this situation, Joan began by drawing up a list of things that she thought Val enjoyed the most. The list included singing, doing her nails, putting on cosmetics, and talking with Val about weekend activities at home as well as her art work. During the first few days of rapport-building, Joan provided these activities to Val without asking her to do anything to get them (“reinforcers were dispensed noncontingently,” in scientific terms.) Joan helped Val to put on cosmetics. She turned on some popular music and sang songs with Val. Because Val like to get strong reactions from others (such as she got whenever she displayed problem behavior), Joan made sure that whenever she and Val were talking, the conversation generated a strong reaction from her. For example, when the two were talking about Val’s weekend shopping expedition, Joan was enthusiastic and animated rather than quiet and matter-of-fact. Joan knew that she was beginning to make progress when Val began to laugh regularly and make conversation spontaneously in the context of these activities.

Example: Juan

When Bill joined the group home, he was assigned to work closely with Juan in order to enhance Juan’s community living skills. The other staff told Bill that Juan was for the most part indifferent to social interaction. this made it difficult for Bill to establish rapport with Juan. At first, Juan completely ignored Bill and spent most of his time sitting on the couch staring at the television. To remedy this situation, Bill found out from the other staff what sorts of things Juan liked. Also, he observed Juan for himself. Bill was able to develop a list of things that Juan like that included food items such as ice cream, cookies, juice, and oranges. Contrary to what the other staff had said, it appeared that Juan sometimes liked people to talk to him in a friendly way although he could not talk. Bill began to build rapport by going up to Juan and handing him some cookies and orange slices. As fast as Juan ate them, Bill was there with more. While Juan was eating, Bill kept up a steady stream of talk about life in the home and aspects of life in the community that Juan had recently experienced, such as neighborhood walks and going shopping. After a few days of this type of interaction, Juan was paying attention to Bill whenever Bill entered the room and was more interested in being near Bill than in sitting on the couch in front of the television.

Comment: Some Initial Issues in Rapport-Building

Val is an example of an individual whose history of negative interactions with other people could prevent communication skills from developing further. Juan is an example of an individual whose lack of experience in interacting with another person could prevent the development of communication skills. Although Val was a rather friendly, social person and Juan was not, rapport-building was essential for both in order to provide a foundation on which to build genuine communicative interaction. Val liked to talk about her art work but Juan did not. Therefore, art work was a conversational topic in working with Val but not in working with Juan. Juan like oranges but Val was not interested in them. Therefore, oranges were freely given out to Juan but were not part of any interaction with Val. Do not assume that what one person likes is what everyone likes. If you do, you will not be treating the person as an individual and rapport probably will not develop.

In the beginning, provide situations that the person likes without conditions (noncontingently). Do not ask the person with disabilities to earn these reinforcers or to ask for them. If you do, he or she may refuse to work and a battle will begin. Also, he or she may not yet know how to ask for the things he or she likes and may become frustrated and tantrum. In either case, any rapport-building will come to an end. The idea at this stage is for the person with disabilities to learn that you are associated with many positive, interesting, and valued experiences and are definitely someone worth paying attention to.

Rapport-building is not something that you do once and then drop in order to move on to something else. Rather, it is something that must continue as long as you have a relationship with the person with disabilities. The initial rapport-building procedure that we just described should take place many times each day. Typically, we have used this initial procedure for 2 or 3 days before adding to it. How will you know when you are succeeding? You will know when the person becomes more responsive to you. He or she will look at you more often, stay close to you, and continue to interact with you, not walk away, once you have approached him or her. He or she will seem happy to see you and smile, laugh, or, if verbal, talk to you when you are around and ask for you when you are not around. In short, the person will appear to be enjoying him- or herself when around you.

The last point, concerning enjoyment and happiness, is important and deserves further comment. Rapport-building is not a mechanical procedure. You should not become a vending machine dispensing positive experiences. The idea is for you and the individual displaying behavior problems to interact with one another within a context of sharing entertaining and rewarding activities and generally enjoying each other’s company. These interactions may strike you or others as “goofing off,” but that is not a problem as long as it leads to an ongoing positive relationship. Ultimately, rapport-building is intended to establish a friendship between you and the person with disabilities, a friendship that can provide a basis for teaching that person that there are other ways besides problem behavior for achieving important goals. Therefore, spontaneous, enthusiastic, and emotionally satisfying interactions are the hallmark of success in building rapport.