2. Behavior Tracker Pro 1.0
Behavior Data Collection for the Google
Android Phone
Steve Maher, Liz Maher, MEd, BCBA
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3. Table of Contents
Introduction 4
PURPOSE
4
GETTING STARTED 4
FOUR MAIN VIEWS 4
Collecting Data 5
TAKE ONLY FREQUENCY AND DURATION DATA 5
TAKE ABC DATA 5
HIGH FREQUENCY DATA COLLECTION 7
Analyzing DATA 8
PER DAY GRAPH VIEWS 10
PHASE CHANGE LINES 10
ADJUSTING AXIS 11
VIEWING LEGEND 11
EXPORTING DATA 12
Saving Data 13
SAVING DATA 13
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4. Introduction
Purpose: Behavior Tracker Pro is an application for iPhone, iPod Touch, Blackberry,
Google Android and Palm WebOS smartphones that allows a BCBA, therapist, parent,
teacher, aide or any other observer to discreetly and accurately take data in the client’s
environment. This document will focus only on the Android based devices.
Getting Started: Once you have purchased and installed BTP, simply launch the
application by tapping on the BTP icon on your device. You will be presented with the
image shown on the front page of this document.
Collecting Data
Four Main Views: Collect Data, Analyze Data, Manage People and Manage ABCs.
The main screen is also known as the Collect Data screen. To navigate to other screens,
activate the menu button on your Android based device. Three buttons appear. Later, we
will use these three buttons to navigate to the other views to analyze data, manage people
and manage ABC’s.
Since we are already automatically at the Collect Data screen, let's take a look at the first
data collection option, “Take Only Frequency and Duration Data”. Before we tap on that
data collection option, let's define why we would want to choose Frequency and Duration
over the other two options.
“Frequency and Duration data should be taken if we have already
determined the function of the behavior. We have topographically defined
the behavior and want to see how often that behavior occurs (frequency)
and how long that behavior lasts (duration). The behavior could be
something we want to see more of (sitting quietly) or an inappropriate
problem behavior (talking during circle time). Either way, we know what
the behavior is and we simply want to track it.”
- Liz Maher, Med, BCBA.
Selecting “Take Only Frequency and Duration” brings us to the “Choose a Client”
screen. Here you can choose a client (the person whose behavior you are tracking) or we
can hit the “plus” symbol at the top left hand corner of the screen to add a new client.
There is no limit to the number of clients whose behavior you can track.
After selecting a client or adding a new one, you will be taken to the “Choose Observer”
screen after tapping the blue “Done” button. Here you can select yourself or add a new
observer if you have not used BTP on this device before. Once you have selected both
the client and the observer, and tapped on the blue “Done” button at the top right hand
corner of the screen, you will be presented with the timer as shown below.
As you can see, the timer screen is green. When you double tap the screen, it will start the
timer and indicate that the timer has been started by turning red. When you double tap the
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5. screen again, the timer stops and reverts to green, ready for the next observed behavior.
Frequency and duration data is easy to take with your Android based device. Double
tapping was selected to avoid accidental starting of the timer with the brush of a hand.
Exiting the timer screen requires a triple tap for the same reason. You must triple tap on
the blue bar at the bottom to exit the timer screen. Each time that you start and stop the
timer while in Frequency and Duration collection mode, you will be prompted to identify
the behavior just observed.
For each observed behavior, you can start and stop the timer and simultaneously include
a video capture as well. Video capture is optional and will allow you to record a video
file to your devices internal memory to further document the behavior. Tap on the grey
check box to activate the selection before starting the timer with a double tap on the main
timer button. The recording screen will appear and you will need to tape the start and stop
buttons on the recording screen to complete the data collection.
When you are finished collecting frequency and duration data, exit the timer screen with
a triple tap on the blue bar. Notice that exiting the timer screen brings you to the “Analyze
Data” screen. We will describe the use of that screen later in this document. For now,
please click on the menu button and select “Collect Data” from the choices revealed. You
will find yourself back at the main screen.
Take ABC Data: The “Take ABC Data” button from the main screen begins the same
way our usage of the “Take Only Frequency and Duration Data” did. You are prompted
to select a client and an observer. In both instances you can select an existing entry or add
a new value by tapping on the plus symbol at the top left hand corner of the screen. The
green timer screen is also identical as you collect ABC Data. Start and stop the timer and
notice that upon stopping the timer you are presented with the following screen:
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6. Much like the client or observer selection screen, you can choose a built in Antecedent or
add a new one by clicking on the plus symbol at the top left hand side of the screen. After
selecting our Antecedent(s) (we can select none, one or many antecedents).
“Be careful when selecting an antecedent. It is important that we really
know what the antecedent was if we are to collect good data and do the
best possible job we can for the client.”
- Liz Maher, MEd. BCBA.
Upon selection of your antecedent and hitting the blue “Done” button at the top right of
the screen, you are prompted to select a behavior and finally a consequence. Note that in
each of three ABC selection screens you can select an existing value or add a new one.
BTP was designed to be flexible and extensible as our clients (students) vary greatly.
Helpful Hint: **If you find that you are leaving the antecedent blank or are selecting
“MO Unclear” often, you should consider a team meeting to better define your
antecedents or possibly the behavior.**
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7. Once you have selected your consequence(s), you are brought back to the timer screen to
again record any observed behavior. The overall routine of collecting ABC data is
identical to Frequency and Duration Data collection except that each start and stop
iteration of the timer in the ABC Data Collection mode asks you to define the antecedent,
behavior and consequence. Other than that, Frequency and Duration Data collection and
ABC Data collection are the same.
High Frequency Behavior Data: The third and final data collection option from the
main screen is the “High Frequency Behavior Data” option. This option can be thought
of as a virtual clicker. You may know what behavior you are tracking but you want to
know the rate of that behavior. Selecting “Take High Frequency Behavior Data” brings
you to the following screen as in the image below.
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8. As with previous screens in BTP, you can select behaviors from the screen or add new
ones. You can also use the “Select All” option to select all the currently defined
behaviors. Once you have made a selection, you click on the blue “Done” button and you
are presented with a data collection screen drawn with the behavior just selected.
You can now single tap any behavior as it is observed. The tally will increment by one
each time. The data will be plotted by rate of occurrences per minute on your Rate of
behavior graphs. These behavior rate graphs are only visible when you double tap the
chart, select “separate ABC’s” and then “Behavior Rate”. The behavior rate graphs are
based only on the data collected in the high frequency data collection mode.
Analyzing Data
When you have finished taking data on a client, you can then analyze the data by tapping
on the “Analyze Data” button at the bottom of the screen. The first step in analyzing your
data is to select the client whose data you want to analyze. Each client that has been
added will appear in the list. Tap on the client you are interested in analyzing. You will
be presented with a choice to “Analyze Client Overall” or the ability to choose a specific
day to analyze as shown below.
At this point you can choose “Graph this Data” and you will be presented with a screen
similar to the one below:
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9. Note that when you display a graph, whether it is the overall view or a view of just one
day, you have to double tap the screen to show the menu at the top and bottom of the
screen. When you double tap the screen the menu looks like image below.
Now with the menu visible, you can adjust the X-axis, graph by Duration or Frequency,
separate the data into ABC’s, move the view left or right if more data is available but
doesn’t fit on the screen, draw the graph manually or export your data. After you have a
couple days’ worth of data, explore these features. At any time, you can tap on your
phones back button to go back.
If you have chosen to collect data using the tally counter and want to view the rate of
behaviors you would first need to go to “Analyze Client Overall”, then select “graph the
data”. Because you want to view information about behaviors, once you are at the
graphing page select “Separate ABCs” and you will see “Rate/bx” tab appear to the right
of the “Duration” and “Frequency” tabs. Select “Rate/bx” and your graph of the rate of
your selected behaviors will appear as shown below.
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10. Per day Graph Viewing: When you choose to analyze your data, you can graph
overall or graph for a specific day. If you choose a specific day and graph the data, the
“Adjust Axis” and “Separate ABCs” buttons are grayed out intentionally. These functions
are only enabled when you have selected “Analyze Client Overall”. When you view the
graph for a specific day, the data will be graphed by duration only. However, by
counting the points on the graph that will give you the frequency of the behavior and by
touching each point information about the behavior and the antecedent and consequence
(if this type of data was taken) will appear.
Phase change lines: Phase change lines are vertical blue lines that appear on both the
overall graph and single day graphs. Throughout a treatment program new variables are
introduced that may or may not have an effect on your client. Changes in behavioral
procedures, changes in medication or diet, the introduction of a new person into the
therapeutic setting or changes of any kind can be added to graphically show pre and post
phase change results on the graph.
You can add a phase change line in two ways. You can either add phase change lines
throughout a specific day at specific times or you can select a specific day and add a
phase change line for that entire day. If you want to add a phase change line for a
specific time of day choose the “Analyze Data” screen, choose a client, choose the date
from the list of “Analyze Specific Day”, and then select one of the specific times from the
“Analyze Specific Time” list. Once you have chosen a specific time, you will see a purple
“Add Phase Change” button. Clicking on the purple button brings up a dialogue box to
enter the label for your phase change line. However by choosing this way of adding a
phase change line you will only be able to view the phase change if you select the
specific day not when you “Analyze the Client Overall”. In order to view a phase change
line on the graph when you select “Analyze the Client Overall” you will need to add the
phase change line to the entire day by selecting “Analyze Specific Day”.
The manner in which data is stored in the BTP database necessitates that you select a
specific data point upon which to apply the phase change line. The iPhone or iPod Touch
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11. needs to know where to draw the line and can do so only along a pre-existing point in
time where data exists.
Adjusting axis: Double tapping a graph and opening the top and bottom menu bars
reveals an “Adjust Axis” button. This button is only visible in a graph of the overall data,
not when you graph a single day. You can set both the start date and the number of data
points to be graphed to zoom in on just the data you want to see.
Figure 10 – Adjust
Axis
Viewing legend: Viewing the legend is important when you have separated your data
into ABCs. Accordingly, the legend button is only visible when you are viewing ABC
data because a legend is not needed if you are viewing a single line frequency and
duration data.
Selecting various views with the “A”, “B” and “C” buttons in the middle of the bottom
menu bar updates your legend to reflect the applicable values.
Tapping on the “Hide Legend” message will retract the legend.
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12. Displaying the legend
Exporting Data: Exporting data is one of the most sought after features in BTP.
Consultants often want to send their data to themselves or others on their team for
archival or offline analysis on a PC or a Mac. While looking at any graph, double tap to
get to the top and bottom menus and select the “Export” button. A choice is then
presented to export a picture (like Figure 11 above) or the raw data via email.
If “CSV File” is selected, the data currently graphed will be sent in comma separated
value format, which is readily importable to Excel, Numbers or any other spreadsheet
Exporting Data
program. Once in Excel, you can manipulate your data in any way that you wish
including graphing with the Excel graphing feature.
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13. Saving Data
Saving your data is important. With any device, you should backup your data on a regular
basis. Exporting the data as discussed on the previous page is not a replacement. It is
important to backup your device regularly. These backups can be used to restore your
device in the event of a hardware failure or the loss of your device due to theft or an
upgrade. If you do not regularly backup your device, you risk losing data.
Exporting your data to images or comma separated values (CSV) files will preserve your
data in an offline format, but this will not allow you restore your lost, stolen or damaged
device. You can export data, but you cannot import so please take regular backups.
The frequency of your backups should be defined by your perception of the importance
of your data. This is a judgment call. If you plug your device in and backup every few
days, this implies that you can “afford” to lose a few days worth of data. If you have
questions about defining a backup schedule please feel free to email us at
steve@behaviortrackerpro.com. We’re happy to help.
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