What Is ABA Therapy… REALLY? (4 Myths Parents Need to Know)

So let's get to myth number one, which I think is pretty prela- prevalent out there, and it is ABA was created for kids with autism.

So that is indeed not true.

Here's the truth.

ABA stands for applied behavior analysis, and behaviorism, which was, uh... happened before the term applied behavior analysis was coined, so behaviorism was a split off from the field of psychology back w- in the time in the early 1900s to mid-1900s when psychology was very cognitive, cognitive only, really Freudian, those sorts of, of theories.

And behaviorism emerged during that time with the work of, of Watson and B.F. Skinner, among others.

So behaviorism and applied behavior analysis was and is based on the experimental research with animals in, in labs as well as with humans, and all the experimentation happened around how animals and humans learned and how they responded to reinforcement.

The term applied behavior analysis and the field of using ABA principles with humans started in 1968 with the, um, publication of the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, which is still the most prevalent, prominent journal in our field.

So ABA, applied behavior analysis, is the science of changing socially significant or important behaviors.

So just like gravity, if you...

If a behavior is reinforced, whether you reinforce it or it's reinforced automatically, it will maintain or go up.

So ABA, as I said, was coined in 1968 and stems off of the research and behaviorism as a split off from psychology.

But in, um...

That all happened in the early to mid-1900s, but in 1970s and 1980s, psychologists and researchers used the body of r- animal resour- research, they used Skinner's analysis of verbal behavior and his other books and papers on behavioral psychology, and in the 1970s and '80s, uh, began to develop procedures for helping kids with developmental disabilities.

And many of these kids back in the 1970s and '80s were in psychiatric wards and institutions, and that was also the period where, um, not great treatment medically was being done in psych units.

Um, and there was a real push to deinstitutionalize children and adults from these institutions.

So it was, um, back then in the '70s and '80s where, um, ABA was really being used to help kids who were previously institutionalized, um, begin to prosper outside of the institutions.

So as I said, ABA is the science of changing behavior, um, with ABA principles operating every day all around us.

We get paid to do work, we get a speeding ticket if we go too fast, and we get a thumbs up on Facebook or a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, if you like this podcast, hint, hint.

Um, but we, um, we get reinforcement-Um, all around us every single day, everything we do.

So the science of ABA is like the science of physics.

If you reinforce a behavior, it will go up, and if the behavior is not reinforced, it will most likely go down.

In addition to being a science, ABA is also used as a term to describe treatment packages for kids with autism because of the ni- the work beginning in the 1970s.

And this is where the controversy, I think, comes in.

So as I said, this was a really rough time for, for psychology, um, and applied behavior analysis because we were using it to help kids who were previously in institutions, even the medical field back then.

I'm a registered nurse, and I was trained in the 1980s, and, and the research, um, in the 1970s and '80s, and I was, I was doing clinical rotations sometimes in, in psychiatric wards.