Association for Behavior Analysis International

This presentation will discuss the foundations of forming an ethical international partnership with individuals wishing to start an ABA center in other countries, using a recently formed partnership in the Dominican Republic as an example. Ethical partnerships formed with organizations outside the United States should be non-exploitative, collaborative, data-based, and culturally-sensitive from the outset. Materials and staff should be locally-sourced, and organizations from the United States side of the partnership should facilitate the building of independence and local capacity, as well as including the BCBA certification of local individuals. This presentation will outline and define these seven characteristics (non-exploitative, collaborative, data-based, culturally-sensitive, locally-sourced materials and personnel, capacity-building, and facilitating BCBA certification), and discuss their application in detail in the partnership between the Global Autism Project and an emerging autism center in the Dominican Republic. Attendees will learn about ethical best-practices of international service delivery, as well as several Dos and Donts for establishing partnership with international organizations. Attendees will also learn about helpful strategies for ethically disseminating behavior analysis in other cultures, both internationally and domestically.

This presentation will include a summary of effective strategies for remotely supervising individuals pursuing BACB certification in other countries, using a newly formed partnership in the Dominical Republic as an example. Various aspects of effective, ethical, and evidence-based remote supervision will be discussed as it applies to working with individuals within the context of another culture. Aspects of supervision that will be reviewed include establishing individualized goals and performance expectations, providing timely feedback and guidance towards meeting goals, developing and ensuring maintenance of clinical skills of the supervisee, and delivering positive feedback to result in effective behavior change. Review of a combined approach including both individualized and group supervision sessions, as well as discussion of ensuring that supervision provided is culturally relevant to both the supervisee and the clients to whom behavior analytic services are being provided, will also be discussed. Those attending this presentation will learn about how to provide individualized, culturally sensitive remote supervision resulting in lasting behavior change.

This presentation will review how ABA practices have come into existence in a third world country such as the Dominican Republic. Currently, there are no BCBAs or ABA training programs locally available, making ABA practices a reality only through remote supervision. As a field of practice, ABA has a very young history in the Dominican Republic. In the past 15 years, there were no in-country services being provided. Through the years, the dissemination of awareness about ABA as a best practice for autism treatment has made many families start looking for solutions to provide therapy for their children in their home country. Many of the current challenges faced by Dominican families that want access to services and the difficulties encountered by professionals trying to provide these services will be discussed. The development of a model that could disseminate the need for ABA services in the population of children with autism, and provide local trainings adapted to the needs of local professionals is a process in the making and will be a shared experience with the present audience.

This presentation will review how ABA is seen in the Dominican Republic. ABA therapy is relatively new in DR, which means that not many families and health professionals who have some relationship with ASD know what ABA targets as an intervention model. The current practices are based on Verbal Behavior and Discrete Trail methods; giving little importance to generalization in the natural environment. Even though awareness is developing regarding how ABA therapy is effective for children with autism, it has been thought of as an intervention for problem behaviors, a non-playful, robotic type of therapy. Its not clear to the public as a whole that behaviors are a huge component of our day to day interactions and that the word behavior does not merely represent aggressiveness or tantrums. There is very little knowledge or awareness on the different types of ABA interventions that exist, making people defer to antiqued images or ideals of behaviorism. Its very important that families and professionals in the autism community of our country have a clear knowledge of what ABA is about.