Children’s Behavior Scale (CBS)
(Children Approximately 1½ to 6+ Years)
Below are the definitions of five targeted behaviors plus descriptions of positive
behaviors that could occur instead of the targeted behavior. We will only rate the targeted
behaviors; the positive behaviors are presented only to contrast with the targeted
behaviors.
After an observation period (“episode”), make two ratings for each of the following
behaviors:
Extent (frequency): 0, 1-2, 3-4, 5+ separate instances of the behavior
Pervasiveness (number of children): 0, 1-2, 3-4, 5+ who displayed the behavior
Indiscriminate Friendliness
Children immediately approach a stranger without hesitation; they touch, hug, grab
the stranger. Count the number of separate instances of touching, hugging, and
other indiscriminately friendly actions.
Positive Behavior: When assessor enters room, young children may retreat warily, hold
onto caregiver with apprehension. Older children may verbally greet the stranger,
approach cautiously, and appropriately try to engage the stranger (e.g., offer a toy, ask
the stranger’s name and converse), ask their caregiver who the stranger is, etc.
Stereotypical/Self-Stimulating Behaviors
Aimless and repetitive rocking, waving or shaking of toys or objects, head nodding
or pounding (but not deliberately harmful—see aggressive/violent behavior below),
swinging of arms and legs, playing with fingers, excessive thumb sucking.
Repetitive, meaningless verbal utterances or actions with toys. Repetitive dance-like
movements performed alone and without noticing if anyone is watching. Assess the
frequency of aimless, repetitive behaviors (behavior must last at least 15 seconds
without interruption although it may present in “fits and stops” to constitute one
occurrence; each 15 seconds constitutes a count) and count the number of children
in which this behavior occurred.
Positive Behavior: Purposeful Engagement. Nearly all children’s actions are purposeful,
goal-directed, and cooperative.
Lack of Self-Regulation (Activity, Impulsivity, Frustration)
Three kinds of behaviors qualify as lack of self-regulation.
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 Excessive, unfocused, impulsive, activity. Constant, impulsive, and autonomous
activity. Moving from one toy, person, or situation to another without much
exploration, play, or engagement with it, conducted in a more or less autonomous
manner without much regard for other children. Impulsive, easily distracted,
frequently jumps to a new toy or activity. Cannot sustain attention to any object,
person, or activity. Is agitated, yells, and screams with no apparent purpose. Assess
the frequency of instances of sustained activity (each occurrence of 15 seconds); do
not consider incidental encounters. If the child stops this behavior, does something
else, and resumes or does another such activity for 15+ seconds, count it as two
occurrences. This behavior tends to be whole body and vigorous activity (see
stereotypy which is often only a single body part, such as a hand or head, or
rocking, rather than running around). In addition, count the number of children in
which this behavior occurred.
Positive Behavior: Limited, focused, purposeful activity. Actions are purposeful, goaldirected, such as in sustained exploration, play, social engagement. Activity is focused
for reasonable periods of time on single objects, persons, situations. Excitement is
directly related to an event, yelling and shouting in excitement, even vigorous activity,
are appropriate to the situation.
______________________________________
 Impatience, frustration. Whines, cries, or gets very upset and physically agitated
if he or she does not get desires met quickly. This must occur in response to some
stimulus. Steals toys from other children or forces his/her way into activity of other
children; cannot wait for his/her turn; gets upset. Difficulty calming down after
frustration or injury. Has temper tantrums (e.g., uncontrolled flailing of limbs,
screaming/crying, falls to floor). Assess the frequency of different instances and
count the number of children in which this behavior occurred. Note: If a child takes
a toy and the victim hits the thief or throws a toy at the thief, this is “violence” (see
below), not frustration.
Positive Behavior: Patience, calm. Waits patiently, finds some other means to the same
end, or does something else when events do not go his/her way or when other children
have toys he/she wants. Does not steal toys or forcibly intrude on other children’s
activities. Waits, shares, or takes turns. Calms or soothes easily and quickly after
frustration or injury.
______________________________________
 State regulation difficulty. Uncontrollable crying, cannot be soothed. Changes in
skin color, breathing, and alertness; sighs, yawns, hiccoughs, or grunts; twitches
and tremors.
Positive Behavior: State regulation. Alert, responsive, calm, stable color, regular
respirator rate, absence of tremors, twitches, and startles.
Extreme Withdrawal
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Extreme withdrawn behavior (little or no movements) accompanied by vacant
staring, does not visually follow activities in room, and total lack of engagement.
Total lack of engagement includes: avoids eye contact; doesn’t respond verbally
when talked to; withdraws, grimaces, or pulls away when touched; seems
unresponsive to affection; refuses to get involved with others or play; and shows no
or limited interest in things. May sit on floor in corner or hide under furniture.
These behaviors must be sustained without interruption for 15 seconds, and count
each 15 seconds as an occurrence. If child is engaging in isolated repetitive actions
(e.g., rocking), score as stereotypic self-stimulation. Assess the frequency of
sustained instances; if child stops for 15 seconds and resumes, this should be
considered 2 distinct instances. In addition, count the number of children in which
this behavior occurred.
Positive Behavior: Purposeful Engagement. Nearly all actions are purposeful, goaldirected, and cooperative. Children are appropriate active or engaged in some
meaningful activity.
Aggressive, Violent Behaviors
There are four kinds of behaviors that qualify as aggressive or violent: Assess the
frequency of incidents of these behaviors and the number of children who display
them.
 Provocative. Provokes, picks on, bullies other children. The child initiates this
behavior without apparent cause (e.g., not a response to frustration---see
“Impatience, frustration”). Deliberately antagonizes or provokes other children to
cry, hit, or fight. Vigorously yells at, gets angry at other children with minimum or
no cause; is excessively verbally or mildly physically aggressive (shoves, pokes,
pinches, forcefully moves a child out of the way, off a toy). This is not playful
activity or innocent but clumsy attempts to engage other children---it is done with
some degree of anger or malice.
Positive Behavior: Does not provoke, pick on, or bully other children. Is not excessively
verbally or physically aggressive with other children. Tends to cooperate, engage other
children; minimum conflicts or anger with others.
______________________________________
 Destructive behavior. Inappropriately throws toys, objects without purpose.
Harms, breaks toys, furniture, equipment, objects with minimum cause (not
innocent accidents). This is done with some degree of anger; it is not simply roughhouse play. It does not matter if the child actually does not intend to break the
object; count it if the behavior is inappropriate. Hurts or pretends to hurt live or toy
animals or dolls.
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Positive Behavior: Plays with toys, equipment, furniture in appropriate ways. Does not
deliberately harm or break toys, furniture, equipment, objects. Plays appropriately, even
lovingly, with live or toy animals or dolls. May play vigorously but not destructively with
objects.
______________________________________
 Self-destructive. Is self-destructive, such as pounds head into wall, hits wall with
fist, picks skin and draws blood. Such actions are deliberate, the child knows what
he or she is doing; it is the intent to hurt oneself, not an ordinary accident. But child
often does not seem to get hurt, cry, or withdraw in pain; there is no shock or
surprise.
Positive Behavior: Does not inflict harm on self.
______________________________________
 Interpersonal violence. Attempts or actually pushes, hits, kicks, bites, or otherwise
physically harms another child or the caregiver. Throws toys at another child in
anger or apparent intent to harm. This may be unprovoked; or it may be provoked
in a non-physical way (e.g., name calling, argument), a response to frustration, or
simply excessive physical force to obtain a toy, move a child out of line, or retaliate
for a reprimand or request by caregiver. If the child repeatedly throws toys at
another child, count each instance.
Positive Behavior: The absence of attempts or actual physical aggressiveness or violence
to another child or caregiver. Other people are influenced calmly and verbally (Don’t do
that.” “I want the truck.” “I don’t want to go outside.”). Children find other ways to
deal with frustration or achieve social or play goals.
Method
The Scale
The scale is intended to count the number of targeted problem behaviors. It does
not include vigorous, physical interactive play (e.g., rough and tumble play, play
fighting) or simple disagreements that occur in play that are not serious or are not
problems for the child, other children, or the caregiver.
The scale consists of five types of targeted behaviors. The description includes a variety
of behaviors, any one of which would qualify as that type of problem behavior(i.e., all
these examples do not need to occur to qualify as an instance of this problem). Positive
behaviors are also described to help the rater understand the nature of the problem
behavior by describing its opposite, but only rate the frequency and pervasiveness of
targeted behaviors that are observed.
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The first targeted behavior consists of atypical behavior with strangers. Procedurally, this
rating is made separately from the others as a result of a special procedure at the
beginning of the assessment period. Subsequently, the assessor makes repeated 5-minute
observations (episodes) and ratings on the other four targeted behavior types.
Procedure
Wards. Only wards containing children 18 months or older should be assessed with this
scale. In mixed age wards, observe children over 18 mos.
Assessment time. The assessment should take place during the “free play” period.
Ideally all children who reside in the group should be present, but in practice some may
be pulled out for special services or activities. At a minimum, more than half the children
should be present for any 5-minute observation.
Stranger behavior. If the assessor has been in the ward making other observations, then
use another strange adult for this assessment. Without clipboard, the assessor/stranger
enters the room clearly far enough to be accessible to the children but not so far that the
assessor is intruding on the children. The assessor should look and smile at each child for
a few seconds in a natural way but otherwise not approach, talk to, or engage any child
for 3 minutes. If children approach, be pleasant, greet them, but do not engage in any
other interaction with them. Very socially and physically aggressive children will need to
be gently helped to disengage (i.e., not hug, grab, or touch the assessor). After 3 minutes,
the assessor should slowly and gently disengage completely from the children and then
leave the room to make the “Indiscriminate Friendliness” rating. After a few minutes to
allow the children to return to typical ward behavior, the assessor returns to the room
with clipboard to make the other observations and ratings. Allow 5 minutes for children
to adjust to the presence of the assessor.
Observation and rating procedure. The assessor should observe the free-play for 5
minutes and then spend approximately 1 minute making the ratings. This should be
repeated for at least two, preferably more, 5-minute observations. These will be mixed
with free play caregiver-child (CCSERRS) observations. Stop the observation if the free
play session is interrupted by visitors (strangers) or some orphanage procedure clearly
interferes with “free play,” such as group singing or dancing, medical procedures, etc.
Also stop if only half or fewer of the children assigned to the ward are present.
Scoring
On the score sheet, the assessor records the number of children present at the time of each
5-minute observation. It is advisable to count the number at the beginning and again at
the end of the observation and compute an average if children come and go frequently
during the 5-minute observation. For each of the five ratings, the assessor checks the
extent or frequency of the targeted behavior and the number of different children who
displayed the targeted behavior during the observation period. An occurrence of a
targeted behavior consists of a qualitatively or quantitatively distinct occurrence of one of
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the behaviors in that type. If a child hits another, stops, and then bites a child, this would
be two qualitatively distinct instances. If a child hits another repeatedly without stopping,
that is one quantitative instance, but if the child hits a child several times, the victim tries
to run away and the child hits the victim again repeatedly, this would be two
quantitatively distinct instances. Obviously, if two separate children both display the
same or different targeted behaviors, those are regarded as separate instances. For some
behaviors, an occurrence is defined by a child continuously displaying the behavior for
15 seconds. Count each 15 seconds as an occurrence.
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4+
2-3
4+
8-12
16+
0
2-3
4-9
8-12+
0
1
2-3
4+
0
0
0
0
0
1
2-3
4+
1
0
0
Extent
Number of Instances
per Child
Single Behavior Rating
(combining extent and pervasiveness)
Number of Kids Displaying Behavior
Pervasiveness
Therefore, you can have a single scale that captures both extent and prevalence but does
not distinguish between them:
Score
0
1
2
3
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Definition
No child displays that behavior
The behavior occurs 1-2 times total, either once by 2
children or twice by one child
The behavior occurs 3-4 times total, from once by each
of 4 children to 1-3 times by 2-3 children
The behavior occurs 5+ times total by at least 3 children
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