BACB/APA Code of Ethics

Articles

Can/Should We Teach Morality?

STUDIES ON MORALS

WHY DID THIS OCCUR?

- “How can we attempt to use behavior analysis to encourage moral behavior when the very morality of behavior analysis itself has often been called into question?”

-A Clockwork Orange

• Alex’s hobbies are ultra violence, rape and Beethoven

• Volunteers for an experimental program that will cure him in 2 weeks

• Classical conditioning: the pairing of an illness-inducing injection with movies of violence. He becomes ill when witnessing, involving or thinking about violence.

•Released but is helpless because of the conditioning and tries to commit suicide

• Government realizes what they’ve done and de-condition him

- Would this procedure actually work?

o Systematic desensitization

o Flooding

- Case in point: morality of behavioral interventions

Problems With Ethics Training by “Osmosis”

Teaching and Maintaining Ethical Behavior in a Professional Organization

• BACB certification at the master’s and doctoral level

- Coursework of teaching experience in ethical conduct

- Current examination (18 questions related to this)

• To maintain BACB certification

- 36 continuing education hours every 3 years

- 3 of these hours dedicated to ethics and professional behavior

• At-risk or vulnerable populations – special ethical problems

• Ethical behavior learned and maintained through contingencies of reinforcement

- When an org. does not promote the learning and maintenance

of ethical procedures, employees’ behaviors might result in

undesirable outcomes

 - Consumers, employees, org. reputation,

finances, ABA field

BENEFITS

The Behavior Analyst as a Teacher

and in the Workplace

Objectives

- The students can explain and apply:

0 The statements of BACB Guidelines 5.0 and 6.0

o The statements of APA Code 7.0

o That being professionally ethical will be a determinant factor in your success as a BCBA

Requirements

- Listen carefully and pay attention!

- Personal statements, comments and/or questions are not only welcomed but desired

Evaluation

- Evaluation will not be a component of this class however, you will be participating in a very fun activity at the end of the period to win candy (hint: pay attention to these Guidelines!)

Carla Bogran

Chelsey Brown

6.06

Conflicts with Organizations

7.06

Assessing Student and Supervisee Performance

7.07

Sexual Relationships

with Students and Supervisees

What is acting as a reinforcer here?

- If demands of an organization conflict with these guidelines

o Clarify the nature of the conflict

o Pledge allegiance to the guidelines

o Resolve the conflict according to the

fullest adherence possible to the

guidelines

- Establish a timely and specific process for providing feedback to students and supervisees

- Evaluate students and supervisees based on their performance on relevant and established

program requirements

- Do not engage in sexual relationships with students or supervisees

7.05

Mandatory Individual or Group Therapy

Organizational Behavior Management

BACB

GUIDELINE 6.0

- If individual or group therapy is required by the course, students must have the option to seek therapy from practitioners unaffiliated with the program

- Faculty who are likely to be responsible for

evaluating students’ performance do not

provide therapy for those students

6.01

Job Commitments

7.01

Designing of Education and Training Programs

The Behavior Analyst

and the Workplace

- Adhere to job commitments made to the employing organization

- Programs are designed to

o Provide the appropriate knowledge and proper experiences

o Meet the requirements for licensure, certification or other goals

as claimed by the program

APA

GUIDELINE 7.0

6.04

Employees’ Interventions

-The behavior analyst

o Adheres to job commitments

o Assess employee interactions before intervention

o Works within their scope of training

o Develops interventions that benefit employees

o Resolves conflicts according the

BACB Guidelines

Education and Training

- Improve individual and group performance and worker safety

- 1st program: Western Michigan University

- JOBM (1977)

- Ranked 3rd most influential in 2003

-Top three topics:

o Productivity and quality

o Customer satisfaction

o Training and Development

7.04

Student Disclosure of Personal Information

Melanie has worked hard to establish the treatment center of her dreams, unfortunately she is having financial difficulties. She has 3 BCBAs and 13 clients, who are all special needs children between the ages of 3 and 10. Two of her BCBAs only have a few years of experience, so she decides it is best that they each handle only 3 children during Group Therapy. However, the 3rd BCBA has extensive experience and has won many awards and certifications for her practice, so Melanie assigns her 7 children in Group Therapy sessions. This will lower her costs and increase her income. The therapist is upset and let's Melanie know she cannot handle 7 children at once. Melanie thinks about it, but decides that hiring another therapist would only raise her expenses.

- Develop interventions that benefit employees AND management

- Psychologists do not require students or supervisees to disclose personal information unless

o It is required for admission

o It is necessary to evaluate or obtain assistance for a student whose personal needs may interfere with their ability to

perform duties competently

7.02

Descriptions of Education and Training Programs

Does anyone see a problem?

5.04

Describing Course Requirements

6.03

Preparing for Consultation

7.03

Accuracy in Teaching

- Current and accurate course descriptions include

o Training goals and objectives

o Stipends and benefits

o Requirements that must be met for satisfactory completion of the program

- Information must be made readily available

to all interested parties

- Provide clear description of demands of course or supervisory relationship

o In writing

o At the beginning of the course or supervisory relationship

- Implement or consult on behavior management programs for which you are adequately prepared

- Course syllabi must include

o Subject matter to be covered

o Bases for evaluating process

o Instructor’s ability to modify syllabi based on pedagogical needs, so long as the students are informed

- When engaged in teaching or training,

professionals must present all

information accurately

Matthew T. Broadhead and Thomas S. Higbee (2012)

Introduction

Bobby Newman (1992)

Who is involved

Coordinator

Bossy Supervisor

Ethical Coordinator

Mitchell M. Handelsman (1986)

Analysts

"Moral Education" Seminar

• Ethics Expert

- BACB Guideline 1.03 (Professional Development)

- Reference for those with less knowledge

• Makes sure the system runs smoothly

• Oversees individual supervision and group meetings

- Considerable supervision experience

-Extensive BACB knowledge

-To identify potential ethic dilemmas

• Extensive knowledge of local, state and federal laws

-BACB Guideline 1.04 (Integrity)

- Ex: mandated reporting

• Drafting a declaration of professional services

- Document that states rules and boundaries between analyst and client

-Confidentiality,, responsibilities, fees, cancellations, etc.

- Employee must review and sign before providing any services

• Whoever hired the ethics coordinator must require

periodical reviews

Reasons Against

The Morality of

Behavior Analysis

Introduction

Individual Training and Supervision

Supervisor

PROBLEM

SOLUTION

• Must be a BCBA

• Knowledge of the BACB Ethical Standards

• BACB Guideline 5.11 (Training, supervision and safety)

Lack of time in training process (raises an ethical issue of its own!)

- Idea: “immoral behavior is reward” – cheating

- He suggested rewarding moral behavior instead

- Arguments against behaviorism

o Reinforcement contingencies are artificial

- Every behavior has a consequence

o All research is derived from animals

- Anachronistic

o Treat people as objects – control and deceit

 - Ambiguity in the word control

Dropping a core course

(APA example)

Faculty not qualified in ALL areas of ethics

Team- teach the course

(lack of responsibility)

• Nature and extent of supervision

- A supervisor will be there at ALL times?

- Not realistic=need and time constraints take precedence over ethical issues

• Competence of supervisors (vicious cycle)

-If supervisors learned through osmosis, students are limited by what

seeped into their brain

-Issues not recognized by the supervisor will not be recognized by the

students either.

• Ethical insult (Veatch and Sollito)

 -“The very selection of a case as one that raises an ethical dilemma may be

taken to imply that the physician involved in the case may have made a

moral mistake”

• Supervisors are cautious to explore these insulting areas

• Ethical issues that arise

 -Cannot guarantee that all ethical issues will arise during supervision

 -Need to find a formal way to teach them ALL

 Practitioners will not be prepared to handle future dilemmas

• The practice of teaching ethics only through supervision

• Understanding of issues will gradually “seep in” during practice

• Veatch and Sollito

- “Probably the most important teaching of ethics takes place between preceptors and students when students are actually involved with patient care and ethical issues arise”

• A majority of programs in psychology did not have an ethics course

Individual Training and Supervision

-Supervise employees on at least a biweekly basis

-Promote discussion of ethical behaviors

- Easier when questions is asked than to bring it up

-Provide feedback and guidance to employees

-Right course of action

• Goal: increase the probability of desirable ethical behavior occurring in the future, resolve current issues

-Document everything

-If supervisor cannot answer- ethics coordinator will have the answer

- Provide feedback and guidance to ethics coordinator

 -Which issues are fairly common? What is a topic

that should be discussed with everyone?

WHY SHOULD

THIS BE DONE

Guest lecturers

(facilitate trainees consultation to such committees in the future)

Faculty not qualified in ALL areas of ethics

KOHLBERG VS SKINNER

Variety of methods that blend theory and application

Too boring

RACIAL INTEGRATION

Walen and Behling (1973)

- Common notion: to end racist behaviors we must first change racist attitudes

- We don’t want to change attitudes, we want t0 change the behavior

- We should first change the behavior and once favorable actions are in place, favorable attitudes will develop as well.

- Kohlberg suggested Skinner’s new approach was not valid

o It ignored freedom and dignity in the learning process

o Modify a person’s behavior without their understanding or accord

- Kohlberg never really understood Skinner

o Skinner did not say ignore freedom and dignity,

o Use of mentalism and hypothetical constructs to assess behavior is inadequate

- Black-white class integration

- Baseline: black and white children isolated themselves

- Intervention: students were reinforced by sitting with a “new friend” at lunch.

 o Black and white children sat together in more than half of the opportunities

 o This behavior generalized to other social activities

- Study was short and results weren’t long lasting

- However, it demonstrated that positive behavior changes can be addressed directly

Criminal Immorality

Cohen and Filipczak-

A New Learning Environment (1989/1971)

- Common notion: Criminals are “moral imbeciles”

o Previous Anti-Social Personality Disorder diagnosis

- None or slight chance of rehabilitation

Lost/Found Items

Self-Help Skills

o Teenage prisoners were placed in a 24/7 environment that reinforced pro-social and adaptive behaviors

o Token economy with an emphasis in academic skills

o Men 14-18 responded to the program effectively

-Violence issue

o Men were integrating themselves with others, they lost the fear through familiarization

- Impressive gains in IQ scores and academic and work skills

- One year later: recidivism among the participants was still 1/3 the rate of regular released inmates

- Three years later: recidivism went back to its normal rate among participants

• Common notion: people who don’t return or make an effort to return something have a low sense of morality

• But…what other contingencies might come into play?

- Common notion: Those who are dependent upon public assistance are lazy, unmotivated and have no “moral fiber”

- Contingencies of the public assistance program do not encourage self-help behavior

o Punishment is used and not reinforcement

a) The students indeed lacked morals and the program only suppressed their behaviors for a while

b) Students lied to the researchers to have access to reinforcers

c) The real world environment failed to maintain the gains of students

- Outside world failed to live up to its responsibilities

- The contingencies that once shaped their anti-social behavior returned

- Lesson: Public system and society fail at being morally sound

Golstein, Minkin, Minikin and Baer (1978)

- “Lost” ads consistently outnumbered “found” ads in 3 local newspapers

o Surplus of thieves in the neighborhood?

- Fee to place the “found” ad was eliminated

o The number of “found” ads consistently outnumbered the “lost” ads in all 3 newspapers

- Lesson: Before we judge a person’s character, we should look at the contingencies that might be governing that behavior

Miller and Miller (1970)

- Reinforced attendance to self-help group meetings

- Attendance increased by about 500% above baseline

- Behavior became generalized

- Lesson: Once self-help behavior is being reinforced, this behavior will become more frequent in the future.

References

Bailey, J. S. & Burch, M. R. (2011). Ethics for behavior analysts: 2nd Expanded Edition. New York:

Routledge. ISBN: 978-0415880299

Behavior Analyst Certification Board (n.d.).BACB Guidelines for Responsible Conduct for

Behavior Analysts. Retrieved from http://www.bacb.com/index.php?page=57#4

Brodhead, M.T. & Higbee, T.S. (2012). Teaching and maintaining ethical behavior in a professional

organization. Behavior Analysis in Practice, 5, 82-88.

Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/

ethics/code/principles.pdf.

Handelsman, M. M. (1986). Problems with ethics training by “osmosis.” Professional Psychology:

Research and Practice, 17, 371-372.

Newman, B. (1992). Can/should we teach morality? In The Reluctant Alliance: Behaviorism and

Humanism (pp. 55-70). Buffalo, NY: Prometheus BooksAmerican Psychological Association(2010).