I Wouldn't Even Want to Go There!

Abstract

Although applied behavior analysis (ABA) is regarded as providing the gold standard for interventions designed to meet the needs of autistic individuals in the United States, elsewhere this is not the case. In Northern Ireland, for example, successive governments have portrayed ABA simply as one of a number of commercially available interventions for autism. In this article, I argue that this view arises directly from the practice of behavior analysts who have courted the development of branded versions of ABA at the expense of promoting ABA directly. Because clinicians who advise government ministers are not trained in ABA, it is understandable that a discrimination issue arises whereby ministers are then encouraged not to invest in only "one of the commercially available interventions." To address this problem, the article ends with a suggestion in how a specially designed ethical code of practice might hold behavior analysts accountable for the discrimination problems that could arise as a consequence of their actions in countries struggling to promote the uptake of ABA.