Section 10: Ethics Flashcards
Ethics and 3 Fundamental Questions
- behaviors, practices, and decisions that address three fundamental questions that guide how you conduct yourself to help others improve their physical, social, psychological, familial, or personal condition
- Ethics is important for furthering the welfare of the client
- 3 Fundamental of Questions of Ethical Pracitce
- What is the right thing to do?
- What is worth doing?
- What does it mean to be a good behavior analyst?
What is the right thing to do?
(one of the three fundamental ethical questions)
- considerations related to cultural practices–what may be acceptable in one culture may not be in another
- differences across time–what was acceptable 20 years ago has changed
- Three things to guide you in the decision making process:
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Professional Training and Experience
- your decision making should be based on your clinical/professional training–NOT your personal history
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Personal History
- your indvidual cultural, religious, or social background that should NOT influence your decisions
- you must recognize your personal history may lead to inappropriate solutions– if so, get help from a supervisor OR excuse yourself from the case
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The Context of Practice
- refers to where you practice and the specific nature of the job
- context determines what is legal vs. illegal and ethical vs. unethical
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Professional Training and Experience
Ethics vs. Legality
What is legal but unethical?
- breaking a professional confidence
- accepting valued heirlooms in lieu of payment
- engaging in consensual sex with a client over the age of 18
What is both illegal and unethical?
- misrepresenting promised services or skills
- stealing from clients
- abuse
- consexual sex under 18
Ethical Codes are:
- guidelines that specify what IS a violation
- guidelines for deciding a course of action or conducting professional duties
- guidelines to help to discriminate between legal and ethical distinctions making us more likely to:
- provide effective services
- maintain sensitivity toward clients
- not break the law or our professional standards of conduct
What is worth doing?
(one of the three fundamental ethical questions)
- Addresses the goals and objectives of practice and focues us to ask the questions:
- what are we trying to accomplish?
- How are we trying to accomplish it?
- is the objective socially valid?
- what is the Risk-Benefit Ratio?
Social Validity
- when results show meaningful, significant, and sustainable change
- when the goals, procedures, and results of an intervention are socially acceptable to the client, behavior analyst, and society
- not every skill has social validity
- Ex. teaching a child who cannot see or walk the skills of traffic safety is not socially valid
- ex. teaching an adult with disabilities to play with children’s coloring books is not socially valid
2 Ways to Assess Social Validity
- Social Comparison
- comparison to an equivalent or typically developing group
- limitation- normative data may not be relevant for the client’s functioning
- Subjective Evaluation of Experts
- evaluation of the client’s performance by experts who are very familiar with the client
- limitation- evaluation may be too subjective and not tell us about the success of the interention
What does it mean to be a good behavior analyst?
(one of the three fundamental ethical questions)
- following professional codes of conduct
- keeping the client’s welfare in your ideas
- following the golden rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you
- a good practitioner is self regulating- seeks ways to calibrate decisions over time to ensure that values, contingencies, and rights and responsibilties are integrated and an informed combination of these is considered
3 Reasons why we abide by ethics
MHS- My hairy sister
- to produce meaningful behavior change of social significance to the client
- to reduce/eliminate harm (e.g. poor treatments, SIB, etc)
- To conform to the ethical standards of learned societies and professional organizations
What are professional standards?
- standards are an umbrella term for everything
- standards are written guidelines that provide a direction for conducting the practices associated with an organization
BACB and the Association for Behavior Analysis
BACB- certifies individual practitioners
Association for Behavior Analysis- accredits university programs
5 Documents Describing Standards of Professional Conduct and Ethical Practice for ABA
TLCEPBT- TLC Eating Peanut Butter Together
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TL - 4th Edition Task List 2015
- describes knowledge, skills, and attributes expected of a BCBA divided into 3 sections
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C - Professional and Ethical Compliance CODE for Behavior Analysts 2016
- replaced The Professional Disciplinary and Ethical Standards AND The Guidelines for Responsible Conduct for Behavior Analysts
- E - The Right to Effective EDUCATION (Association for Behavior Analysis) 1990
- P - Ethical Principles of PSYCHOLOGISTS and Code of Conduct (APA) 2010
- BT- The Right to Effective BEHAVIORAL TREATMENT (Association for Behavior Analysis) 1989
1.0 Responsible Conduct of Behavior Analysts
“Behavior analysts maintain the high standards of behaivor of the profession”
- 01 Reliance on Scientific Knowledge
- 02 Boundaries of Competence
- 03 Maintaining Competence through Professional Development
- 04 Integrity
- 05 Professional and Scientific Relationships
- 06 Multiple Relationships and Conflicts of Interest
- 07 Exploitative Relationships
A behavior analyst refers to an individual who holds the BCBA or BCaBA credential, an individual authorized by the BACB to provide supervison, or a coordinator of a BACB Approved Course Sequence. Where Code elemetns are deemed relevant to the practice of an RBT, the term behavior analyst includes the behavior technician.
1.01 Reliance on Scientific Knowledge
Behavior analysts rely on professionally derived knowledge based on science and behavior analysis when making scientific or professional judgments in human service provision, or when engaging in scholarly or professional endeavors.
1.02 Boundaries of Competence
(a) All behavior analysts provide services, teach, and conduct research only within the boundaries of their competence, defined as being commensurate with their education, training, and supervised experience.
(b) Behavior analysts provide services, teach, or conduct research in new areas (e.g., populations, techniques, behaviors) only after first undertaking appropriate study, training, supervision, and/or consultation from persons who are competent in those areas.
1.03 Maintaining Competence through Professional Development
Behavior analysts maintain knowledge of current scientific and professional information in their areas of practice and undertake ongoing efforts to maintain competence in the skills they use by: reading the appropriate literature, attending conferences and conventions, participating in workshops, obtaining additional coursework, and/or obtaining and maintaining appropriate professional credentials.
CLAC
- C- CEUs
- L- read literature
- A- additional coursework
- C- Conferences/workshops
1.04 Integrity
(a) Behavior analysts are truthful and honest and arrange the environment to promote truthful and honest behavior in others.
(b) Behavior analysts do not implement contingencies that would cause others to engage in fraudulent, illegal, or unethical conduct.
(c) Behavior analysts follow through on obligations, and contractual and professional commitments with high quality work and refrain from making professional commitments they cannot keep.
(d) Behavior analysts’ behavior conforms to the legal and ethical codes of the social and professional community of which they are members.
(e) If behavior analysts’ ethical responsibilities conflict with law or any policy of an organization with which they are affiliated, behavior analysts make known their commitment to this Code and take steps to resolve the conflict in a responsible manner in accordance with law.
1.05 Professional and Scientific Relationships
(a) Behavior analysts provide behavior-analytic services only in the context of a defined, professional, or scientific relationship or role.
(b) When behavior analysts provide behavior-analytic services, they use language that is fully understandable to the recipient of those services while remaining conceptually systematic with the profession of behavior analysis. They provide appropriate information prior to service delivery about the nature of such services and appropriate information later about results and conclusions.
(c) Where differences of age, gender, race, culture, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, language, or socioeconomic status significantly affect behavior analysts’ work concerning particular individuals or groups, behavior analysts obtain the training, experience, consultation, and/or supervision necessary to ensure the competence of their services, or they make appropriate referrals.
(d) In their work-related activities, behavior analysts do not engage in discrimination against individuals or groups based on age, gender, race, culture, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, language, socioeconomic status, or any basis proscribed by law.
(e) Behavior analysts do not knowingly engage in behavior that is harassing or demeaning to persons with whom they interact in their work based on factors such as those persons’ age, gender, race, culture, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, language, or socioeconomic status, in accordance with law.
(f) Behavior analysts recognize that their personal problems and conflicts may interfere with their effectiveness. Behavior analysts refrain from providing services when their personal circumstances may compromise delivering services to the best of their abilities.
1.06 Multiple (Dual) Relationships and COnflicts of Interest
(a) Due to the potentially harmful effects of multiple relationships, behavior analysts avoid multiple relationships.
(b) Behavior analysts must always be sensitive to the potentially harmful effects of multiple relationships. If behavior analysts find that, due to unforeseen factors, a multiple relationship has arisen, they seek to resolve it.
(c) Behavior analysts recognize and inform clients and supervisees about the potential harmful effects of multiple relationships.
(d) Behavior analysts do not accept any gifts from or give any gifts to clients because this constitutes a multiple relationship.
Definition of Multiple Relationship:
one in which a behavior analyst is in both a behavior analytic role and non behavior analytic role simultaneously with a client or someone closely associated with or related to the client
Information on Conflicts of Interest
- When a principal party, alone or in connection with family, friends, or associates, has a vested interest in the outcome of the interaction
- The relationship is beneficial to the behavior analyst in some way
- It involves a personal relationship with crossed boundaries, such as unsolicted gifts or invitations to parties
- You must guard against crossing any personal or professional boundaries
- General Rule- when in doubt if a boundary was crossed, consult a supervisor or experienced confidante
1.07 Exploitative Relationships
(a) Behavior analysts do not exploit persons over whom they have supervisory, evaluative, or other authority such as students, supervisees, employees, research participants, and clients.
(b) Behavior analysts do not engage in sexual relationships with clients, students, or supervisees, because such relationships easily impair judgment or become exploitative.
(c) Behavior analysts refrain from any sexual relationships with clients, students, or supervisees, for at least two years after the date the professional relationship has formally ended.
(d) Behavior analysts do not barter for services, unless a written agreement is in place for the barter that is (1) requested by the client or supervisee; (2) customary to the area where services are provided; and (3) fair and commensurate with the value of behavior-analytic services provided.
Definition of a Client
- The term client refers to any recipient or beneficiary of the professional services provided by a behaivor analyst.
- It includes, but is not limited to
- the direct recipient of services
- the parent, relative, legal representative, or legal guardian of the recipient of services
- the employer, agency representattive, institutional representative, or third party contractor for services of the behavior analyst, and/or
- any other individual or entitiy that is a known beneficiary of services or who would normally be construed as a client or client surrogate
- It does NOT include
- third party insurers or payers unless you are hired directly under contract by the third party insurer or payer
2.0 Behavior Analysts’ Responsibility to Clients
Behavior analysts have a responsibility to operate in the best interest of clients.
The term client as used here is broadly applicable to whomever behavior analysts provide services, whether an individual person (service recipient), a parent or guardian of a service recipient, an organizational representative, a public or private organization, a firm, or a corporation.
- 01 Accepting Clients
- 02 Responsibility
- 03 Consultation
- 04 Third-Party Involvement in Services
- 05 Rights and Prerogatives of Clients
- 06 Maintaining Confidentiality
- 07 Maintaining Records
- 08 Disclosures
- 09 Treatment/Intervention Efficacy
- 10 Documenting Professional Work and Research
- 11 Records and Data
- 12 Contracts, Fees, and Financial Arrangements
- 13 Accuracy in Billing Reports
- 14 Referrals and Fees
- 15 Interrupting or Discontinuing Services
2.01 Accepting Clients
Behavior analysts accept as clients only those individuals or entities whose requested services are commensurate with the behavior analysts’ education, training, experience, available resources,
and organizational policies. In lieu of these conditions, behavior analysts must function under the supervision of or in consultation with a behavior analyst whose credentials permit performing such services.
2.02 Responsibility
Behavior analysts’ responsibility is to all parties affected by behavior-analytic services. When multiple parties are involved and could be defined as a client, a hierarchy of parties must be established and communicated from the outset of the defined relationship. Behavior analysts identify and communicate who the primary ultimate beneficiary of services is in any given situation and advocate for his or her best interests.