Family Systems and Positive Behaviour Support

What if the behaviour isn’t just about the person, but the system around them?

One of the most powerful shifts I’ve made in my PBS practice has come from integrating ideas from Family Systems Therapy.

Rather than viewing behaviour as something in the individual, Family Systems approaches ask us to consider the relational context:

-What patterns are playing out across the family or support team?
-How is this behaviour maintaining or disrupting those patterns?
-What roles are people (unknowingly) stuck in?
-Is this behaviour serving a function within the system, not just for the individual?

In PBS, we often isolate the behaviour, assess the function, and intervene at the individual level.

But sometimes that lens is too narrow.

For example:
-A young person who escalates whenever Mum starts talking to the support worker, is it about attention, or is it protecting a bond?
-A participant who refuses to use communication tools with staff but not with their sibling, is it a skill gap, or a relationship difference?

Systems thinking asks us to look wider.
To see behaviour as a conversation, not just a message.
To explore how everyone around the person is responding, reinforcing, or reacting.

And crucially, it shifts the practitioner’s role.

We’re not just behaviour analysts.
We become pattern observers, relational allies, and meaning-makers.

Because change doesn't always happen in the individual.

Sometimes it happens in the space between people.