Evidence-Based Therapies for Oppositional Behavior in Young Children

Abstract

(create) The primary purpose of this chapter is to present and critically evaluate current evidence-based interventions for oppositional behavior (OB) in young children. Children with OB are typically described by parents and teachers as argumentative, disobedient, disruptive, demanding, and defiant. We have operationalized "young children" as including children between the ages of 3 and 8, thus encompassing the preschool and early school-age periods. Although OB can be manifested in a variety of child disorders, this chapter focuses on OB manifested in the broader context of "conduct problems" [i.e., oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) and/or conduct disorder], as that is the area for which evidence-based treatments exist. Likewise, the focus of this chapter is on family-based interventions, as this is the locus of most of the evidence base for treatment of OB in young children. The first section of this chapter consists of a description of OB, including diagnostic criteria, noncompliance, epidemiology, conceptualizations, and developmental pathways. The second section of the chapter provides a description of family-based interventions for OB and a discussion of several cross-cutting issues concerning such family-based interventions. We present several parent training programs as examples of state-of-the-art family-based interventions for young oppositional children. The chapter concludes with a brief case example and suggestions for the enhancement of the clinical utility of these interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).