The founder of ABA said the following about Autistic kids:

“You see, you start pretty much from scratch when you work with an autistic child. You have a person in the physical sense – they have hair, a nose and a mouth – but they are not people in the psychological sense...."

"One way to look at the job of helping autistic kids is to see it as a matter of constructing a person. You have the raw materials, but you have to build the person.”

Lovaas strongly believed in intense behavioral modification interventions, that included harsh aversive techniques such as withholding touch and attention, isolation, and even giving electric shock "therapy"...

in 1976 the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health took away his funding “due to complaints of excessive use of corporal punishment against children.

So... when people say "modern ABA is better" or "not my ABA" - I ask HOW can something founded on these HORRIBLE principals be anything but harmful to Autistic people?

@threadreaderapp - unroll, please.