Working with young people who engage in self-injury, problematic substance uses, and other 'risky' behaviours can be challenging in several ways. They can be visually confronting to the practitioner, hard to disentangle from other issues the young person may be experiencing, and a barrier to addressing some of these other issues. In this workshop we will look at how we can understand this from a functional perspective - what does the young person like about this behaviour? We will then consider different ways of understanding that, and different approaches and interventions. The seminar will offer you some frameworks for understanding as well as practical skills for your professional skill set.
