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A
Brief History of Behavior Analysis and Autism
Richard W. Malott1
Behavior Analysis Program
Department of Psychology
Western Michigan University
Applied
behavior analysis and autism are an amazing couple. Over 30 years
ago, a clinical psychologist did some time at the University of
Washington, the source of most of the early research on applied
behavior analysis. Inspired and informed by his Washington training,
the clinician went to LA and put his own spin on behavior analysis,
as he started working with children whose behavioral repertoires
had so many deficits of functional behavior and so many excesses
of dysfunctional behavior that they were labeled autistic. He didn’t do anything new, except possibly disregard all of
his education in traditional clinical psychology. All he did was
apply training procedures that had been in use for many years in
the basic behavior-analysis research labs—procedures whose
effectiveness had been well documented in peer-reviewed scientific
publications.
Oh, yes, he did add one small twist to what had been done before,
he had the outrageous audacity to apply those training procedures
40 hours per week for 2 years with each kid, rather than use the
traditional clinical-psychology talk-therapy approach of meeting
with the “patient” for a 50-minute hour once
a week. He then published his results in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
The results, as anyone reading this already know were that 50% of kids he worked
with lost all traces of their autistic problems and the remaining 50% were also
greatly improved. And thus Ivar Lovaas started the revolution in the “treatment
of autism.”
But the revolution languished. Lovaas and the behavior analysts he trained as
well as other behavior analysts continued to do and publish high-quality research,
extending and refining his procedures. But only the small group of scientists
known as behavior analysts were aware of this amazing work, perhaps the most
impressive work in the field of behavior analysis.
Then, 30 years after Lovaas started his revolutionary but almost invisible research,
a woman with a Ph.D. in literary criticism, or some equally irrelevant topic,
had a little girl and then a little boy whose behavioral repertoires were so
dysfunctional that they got the autism label. Well, after a few heart-breaking
years, this mother finally found Lovaas’ behavior-analysis approach and
with much work and dedication on her part and the part of Bridget Taylor, the
behavior tech working with them, her children were normalized.
And being a word woman, the Ph.D. in literary criticism then wrote what may be
the most important book in the field of behavior analysis, an autobiographical
case study of her two children, a non-technical case study for non-behaviorists.
And being a word woman, this Ph.D. in literary criticism knew how to put the
words together so as to tell her story with such warmth and such emotional impact
that parents around the world are now demanding that Lovaas’ behavior-analysis
training procedures be rescued from the obscurity of the previous 30 years and
be used to help their own children achieve more normal lives. Of course, the
word woman is Catherine Maurice; and her book is Let
Me Hear Your Voice.
If there had been no Ivar Lovaas, there would be no demonstration of the real
power of applied behavior analysis to completely transform people’s lives.
And, if there had been no Catherine Maurice, no one would know about this power
of applied behavior analysis to completely transform people’s lives. An
amazing collaboration between science and art.
Lovaas2 and
Maurice started the revolution, but the revolution is far from over. Fortunately,
some of the brightest, best-trained, most hard-working researchers and practitioners
in the field of behavior analysis are dedicating their lives to continuing and
spreading this revolution.
And many of these researchers and practitioners have joined with parents of children
labeled autistic to form the associations advocating behavior analysis in autism.
These associations may be the next major component in the behavior-analysis/autism
revolution, providing a systematic way to educate professionals and the public
so they can demand behavior-analytic training programs for children labeled autistic,
so that there will be enough well-trained behavior analysts to implement these
programs, and so that quality-control standards will be implemented to maintain
the integrity of these programs.