Baselining

An initial set of observations to compare the performance of a person while doing different activities to serve as a foundation for predictions about the person's pattern of performance.

Pattern of Performance

A pattern of performance is a general set of expectations that predict what people in a designated group can and cannot do. Consistency is expected. Inconsistencies can be predicted to some extent when common confounding factors are defined and adjustments in predictions are made.

A failure to provide a positive experience while doing the activity is a serious problem for an affirmative activity, but no big deal for an evaluative activity. To sustain long-term engagement in doing the activity, an affirmative sense of some kind must be formed.

When creating affirmative activities, obsolete identities can often be seen as an obstacle. The person may dislike doing activities which are seen as being beneath them. They may refuse treatment as they do not see themselves as having a problem. Using the person's obsolete identity to create affirmative activities may be the solution. Nancy Reagan would help her husband Ronald Reagan get ready for a "working day at the office". He would eat breakfast, get dressed nicely in his suit and go to the office. The secretaries had blank paperwork for him to sign and he was happily occupied.

A favourable sense of identity, comfort, safety, security, satisfaction, pleasure, or achievement can be formed while people with a cognitive disability are doing activities. Measures of attendance and sustained attention time can quantify being busy. We all know that being busy is not always affirmative, i.e. a necessary evil. Confirming the value and dignity of a person requires a decent lifestyle that includes favourable activity experiences. Nothing to do between meals is the antonym, and the message received by the person is disrespectful.

Direct assistance is required when the person is unable to carry out all or part of the task. Sometimes the carer needs to set up the task when the person lacks the ability to plan the task, e.g. for a person functioning in ACL 3 High, the carer lines up the clothing on the bed in the correct order for the person to get dressed.