A pleasing and simple interface that’s easy to understand tops off Behavior Journal. So what is this? It’s an iPhone app that allows you to track and graph your child’s behavior… in a journal of sorts. And it does a good job too.

When you first open up the app, you’re prompted to specify a password in order to protect the information you enter within Behavior Journal. That’s a nice gesture, but the password feature is virtually useless because it can be easily changed or deleted entirely within the device’s settings area. Setting a password may keep a young child from accessing Behavior Journal, but it won’t deter anyone else, so my family doesn’t bother using it. We do use the iPhone’s own password protection, however. And that does keep prying eyes out.

If you are a parent with multiple kids Behavior Journal can handle that. If you’re a therapist with multiple clients, that’s no problem. You can enter several names and track them and keep data on all of them independently. You can also specify your own antecedents, behaviors, and consequences if they differ from the default set provided within the app. So you have great flexibility.

Once you enter a name you are ready for an “Event” and then fill in the data. By touching the name you are taken to another screen that’s awaiting you to touch “Start”. But you don’t want to touch that button until a behavior occurs. Once a behavior is in motion you touch “Start” and Behavior Journal keeps time for the duration of the behavior. When the behavior has ended you touch “Stop” and you begin filling in the antecedents, behaviors and consequences, as well as altering the duration if need be, and typing in some notes.

The nicest feature about Behavior Journal is the ability to graph the data you’ve entered. Within the app the developers provide a button that says “Chart” and that’s the one you want to select in order to see the data graphed. The graph is nicely done. It’s pleasing to the eye and easy to look at. The developer chose good colors and the graph is not cluttered.

Backing up to the beginning a bit – after you sign into the app and create an account with their free online portal you then have the ability to sync your data wirelessly, which also allows you to further analyze that data from your computer. Cool feature.

In Behavior Journal as well as the online portal you can look at data you’ve entered in the past. Within the app you can enter specific ABC’s (Antecedents, Behaviors, Consequences) for specific children OR have them apply to all children so you can choose them with anyone. “Reports” gives you details on the data you’ve entered. You can put a new child into Behavior Journal at any time and you can delete them at any time.

As a parent, and a person with a Bachelor’s Degree in Management Information Systems, I find it difficult to really draw conclusions from the data I’ve recorded. I’ll admit, that might just be my personal shortcoming and not the app’s. The ability to merge and split the data based on behaviors makes it easier to draw conclusions though. Bottom line – If you’re a parent or therapist looking for an app that allows you to enter behavioral data and then extrapolate information on what’s working and not working Behavior Journal may be for you.