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Interesting paper on Autism and ABA

The link below is to a paper by Damien Milton about the use of ABA on autistic people/children.

For anyone unfamiliar, ABA (Applied Behavior Analysis) is a process used to "modify" autistic behaviour into neurotypical behaviours using punishment (including electric shocks) and reward, in order to eliminate autistic behaviours in the subject.

https://kar.kent.ac.uk/69268/1/Applied behaviour analysis.pdf
I skimmed through the paper and am appalled. Although I generally favor a Skinnerian approach to psychology, autism is not a psychological or behavioral situation. It is a brain wiring situation, and attempting to force behavioral change to some outside determined "norm" can only exacerbate problems.
I'm going to have to sit back and collect my thoughts on this for a bit before writing more.
 
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I've always thought ABA seemed a bit too "Pavlovian".

With the main concern being that we are autistic human beings. Not autistic dogs.
 
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"And that's all I have to say about that." - Forrest Gump

The Autistic Community does not support Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA)

Good link here's some stuff in it :


ASAN have a number of core position statements, that relate to autism interventions and therapies. These include:

  • Nothing About Us Without Us
  • the use of scientifically unproven treatments and those that focus on normalization rather than teaching useful skills should be discouraged
  • Acceptance of difference is essential to understanding, accepting, and benefiting from the contributions of everyone in our society
  • Functioning labels significantly downplay the uniqueness of each individual, leading to artificial and inaccurate classifications that can cause Autistic people to be denied either services or opportunities.
  • ASAN advocates the passage of both federal and state legislation fully banning the use of aversives and banning non-emergency restraint and seclusion
  • Many therapies and products for Autistic children and adults are helpful and should be made more widely available, such as physical therapy, speech therapy, occupational therapy, and augmentative and assistive communication technology (including supported typing, facilitated communication and other methodologies that support communications access). However, ASAN opposes the use of behavioral programs that focus on normalization rather than teaching useful skills. One of the guiding principles underlying the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is respect for the right of children with disabilities to preserve their identities. Autistic children should not have to grow up constantly being told that their natural behaviors are wrong and that they cannot be accepted as they are.
 
I will not do to my dog what ABA does to autistics, period.

After training, my dog remains a dog. She is not "no longer meeting the criteria for canine-ism. "
 
Your description was more than enough to persuade the reading of the paper. :p

It's things like this that make it so incredibly exciting to meet someone who is accepting and kind, seeing as some people make a living, an organization, a practice, out of doing just the opposite.

I just came from a doctor who is the kindness that stands in minority and polarity to those referred to in your description. :cool:

Yay! :D
 
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Damien who wrote the report is autistic himself and has an autistic son. He does some excellent work. If you see anything else by him in your travels I'd recommend reading it.
 
The university speech and language clinic that I work as a graduate student works with some autistic children who also attend a local school that uses ABA. Our clinic does not use ABA but instead focuses on understanding things from the autistic clients' perspectives and building skills based on the client's own strengths, weaknesses, needs, and interests. It's not perfect because it's still mostly neurotypical people trying to understand autistic people, and of course most of the treatment is done by graduate students without much experience, but it's still remarkable how well they are doing. The reason I mention this here is because two separate families have been so impressed with how much better their children have done since coming to our clinic that they've requested that specialists from the ABA-based school come observe how our clinic works with their children. In both cases the ABA people were amazed at how well the children do at our clinic where there is no ABA.
 
What bugs me most about this sort of thing is that it projects an assumption that any and all autistic traits and behaviors can be aggressively altered through such processes.

Kind of like the Marine Corps slogan, "Can't Means Won't". :rolleyes:

This completely ignores the reality that apart from us all having different traits, behaviors and corresponding amplitudes of them, we also have those which may be neurologically "hard-wired".

Those specific traits and behaviors that are simply beyond our ability to address, no matter how badly we personally might want to change or even eliminate them. It's not like any of this is a choice!
 
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What bugs me most about this sort of thing is that it projects an assumption that any and all autistic traits and behaviors can be aggressively altered through such processes.

Kind of like the Marine Corps slogan, "Can't Means Won't". :rolleyes:

This completely ignores the reality that apart from us all having different traits, behaviors and corresponding amplitudes of them, we also have those which may be neurologically "hard-wired".

Those specific traits and behaviors that are simply beyond our ability to address, no matter how badly we personally might want to change or even eliminate them. It's not like any of this is a choice!
This is very untethical, but I mean it would be interesting to try and see what happens if we try to fix some NT kids.
 
"And that's all I have to say about that." - Forrest Gump

The Autistic Community does not support Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA)
I just want to say that I quit working in ABA when I learned what it was really about. I was a therapist for a short time and was extremely affected myself by the way they treated the children. No one is doing it like it is supposed to be and I don't think it is right to do any of this regardless. I am not on the spectrum. I have utter reverance and respect for those that are and am completely horrified by the state of ABA. No person can ever know what another might need or feel.

This whole ABA thing is gross and just as an idea feels deranged and inhumane. I've been in a shock since I quit awhile back and am now reading up on more of the autism community's statements on it. This has been a kind of support while I have been recovering from the experience. I examined the so called evidence base for ABA today and saw that the research is for something so different than what is done in clinics today. I'm not surprised by the fraud of therapies in the US at this point, but I'm still horrified by the lies and reality.

Maybe there is a way I can help the autism community as an ally in advocacy against ABA? I finished the whole Masters degree and the sham of a supervision.

I'm trying to find out if the right thing is for me to stay as a special Ed teacher, be someone who is educated about the real voice of the community. Be at least one safe space for people.

Im really stuck as a member of the exceptional population myself, with special needs of my own, and very few resources right now. But I will never ever harm a human and I won't ever take a paycheck from an abuser calling themselves therapy like ABA. I'm looking for something else and I don't even want to go near anything that funnels people into ABA.

I am a very very good teacher and I have an advanced education, better than any BCBA I ever met. I thought maybe teaching special Ed would be correct, but I'm afraid to do that too now. For one, I'd want to inform every parent about the dangers of the fraudulent, harmful treatments out there and I'm afraid that will get me in trouble. Bosses got very mad at me for standing up for the kids before. I won't back down on speaking out for what's right so I tried to quit the whole work entirely. No one can interfere with what I say in my personal life. But then I found out the other job options were all corrupt too.

Can I be a safe special Ed teacher? Is school safe for people with special needs? How can I even be sure I'm doing anything right? All this research is lies, I don't trust anything I read anymore! And I don't want to deal with any parents who dont meet my standards for proper care of their kids. What if I do something that hurts those kids and they can't say it until they are older like this ABA? I can't put a vulnerable person at risk.

I want to do something that matters and the only teaching I am suited for is special Ed. With so many children suffering from bad teachers, is the right thing for me to go and be the safe, smarter teacher they need?

I know I'm writing so much and I hope this is okay. I have so many feelings about this and so many questions. The danger of ABA and the people suffering from it makes me frantic. Reading more today has been absolutely awful, I have been through something similar to these stories from adults who were victims of ABA and am just chilled to the core by these accounts. I feel like I have reconnected with something very right today, at least, my assertions of innallieable human rights and a community of people speaking out. Finally, this is right.
 
Using punishment (including electric shocks) and reward, in order to eliminate autistic behaviours in the subject./QUOTE]

Is there even a reward system in ABA? I've only seen multiple versions of the punishments or even the same type of tiring exercises applied for no reason after they finish a task even if they didn't do something "wrong".

I guess the "reward" is not getting extra exercises.
 

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