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Category: Intervention

A young girl in a red dress arranging blocks on a table
A young girl in a red dress arranging blocks on a table.
ABA Reform: Distinguishing Meaningful Change and “Neurodiversity Lite”

ABA Reform: Distinguishing Meaningful Change and “Neurodiversity Lite”

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I’ve been doing some more thinking on that most controversial of controversial autism questions: ABA. Right now, most neurodiversity advocates don’t trust the idea that any sort of ABA intervention could be a good thing, and why should they?  Far too many ABA interventionists have been pointing to a few modest changes to their programs – like removing aversives, or adding some cosmetic “neurodiversity lite” jargon – and claiming that this makes their programs adequate and ethical.  But that’s not…

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A young child in a green shirt
Behaviour Intervention: Some Key Terms

Behaviour Intervention: Some Key Terms

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Hopefully the fact this post has “behaviour intervention” in the title should act as a content warning to anyone who might find a discussion about ABA triggering, but just to be sure, here’s one now. – – Not long ago, I was complaining about the way advocates and researchers/professionals often talk past one another in the field of ABA.  I grumbled that terms like “ABA” were constantly being understood in different ways, so that even if these groups could get…

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Two hands meeting, with one above and the other below.
Supports, Burdensomeness, and Dependence

Supports, Burdensomeness, and Dependence

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Research suggests that volunteering and helping others can be beneficial for the mental health of the helper.  This effect is believed to stand above and beyond any tendency for those with better mental health to be more likely to volunteer for things in the first place. Conversely, dependence on others and being a recipient of help can be bad for mental health.  Indeed, a major component of the dominant interpersonal theory of suicide suggests that those who perceive themselves as…

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A still image from a controversial advertisement produced by Apple in 2016 that depicts the RPM method. The RPM client, Dillon Barmache, maintains a website at https://typing4change.com/.
More Thoughts on RPM and FC

More Thoughts on RPM and FC

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I’ve decided to write this in order to essentially revisit a topic that I last addressed in a post a couple of years ago.  This post, regarding the Rapid Prompting Method (RPM), has (based on number of views) apparently received a lot of traffic compared to other posts on this blog, no doubt because of the vital importance of protecting people’s right to communicate. Being profoundly aware of the importance of the right to communicate, as well as fully cognizant…

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Word cloud featuring terms such as evidence-based, outcomes, improve, practice, change, support, etc.
The Shortcomings of Evidence-Based Practice

The Shortcomings of Evidence-Based Practice

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I’m finding myself increasingly annoyed by the emphasis on evidence-based practice in the autism world. This is not because I don’t see the value in responsible intervention practices that are consistent with research and theory.  There are still far too many people who are taken in by alternative pseudoscience, quack treatments, and faith healing in a vain attempt to “cure” autism.  Even if we leave aside the important ethical question of whether a “cure” for autism itself is truly desirable,…

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Pathology and Motivation to Access Supports

Pathology and Motivation to Access Supports

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In previous posts, I’ve criticized the “pathology paradigm” of autism.  I believe that there are a number of problems with this paradigm, but I always find myself returning to one that I find especially glaring: when we describe autism as pathology, when we use the language of deficit and disorder, we’re very openly suggesting to autistic people – a marginalized population with high vulnerability to mental health challenges – that there is something fundamentally wrong with them.  Autistic people are…

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Deficit Isn’t a One-Way Street

Deficit Isn’t a One-Way Street

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Sometimes, the best way to see where our conventional assumptions can go wrong is to consider concrete examples. Within the pathology paradigm, we assume that autistic people are disordered, that they have deficits in different skills and abilities, but we don’t critically examine how autistic people’s environments and the typically-developing people within these environments might contribute to autistic people’s disabilities.  We ignore the possibility that the typically-developing person might be something less than a normative ideal of perfection. Autism and…

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Practical Executive Functions

Practical Executive Functions

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Lately, I’ve been devoting a lot of thought to the question of how we can best conceptualize executive functions with an eye towards the real world: towards practical concerns like strategies and interventions that can help us to improve our time management skills. I’ve heard some autistic people arguing that we shouldn’t be trying to force anyone who struggles with executive functions and organization to improve through effort and force of will.  Instead, the argument goes, we should provide accommodations…

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Exclusion Diets

Exclusion Diets

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Warning: I write this post with a minimal and superficial knowledge of the science of diet and nutrition.  I am obviously not in any way, shape, or form, qualified to give medical or dietary advice. You may have heard claims that autistic people need to exclude particular foods from our diets.  These exclusion diets are one of the most popular types of complementary & alternative medicine intervention in the autism world (Perrin et al., 2012).  Special diets may indeed be…

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Do We Spend Enough Time Thinking About Independence?

Do We Spend Enough Time Thinking About Independence?

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Sometimes, the things we don’t talk about can be very revealing. I’ve previously written about my fear that many autistic people are becoming dependent on supports and failing to surpass the low expectations that others have of us.  While this usually doesn’t cause too many problems in childhood, it can be disastrous in adulthood.  Not only does the adult transition take autistic people into new and unfamiliar environments, with greater demands, but our society strips away most supports just as…

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