Perceptions of Behavior Analysis in France: Accuracy and Tone of Posts in an Internet Forum on Autism
Your Reddit posts can breach the Ethics Code—audit your own social-media footprint against the 2022 code today.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Turgeon et al. (2021) read every Reddit post about ABA in a large French autism forum. They coded each post for accuracy and for possible ethics-code slips.
The team wanted to see how everyday ABA talk lines up with the new BACB rules.
What they found
Most posts by ABA users were polite and fact-based. Still, some broke the 2022 BACB Ethics Code.
The authors flagged the risky posts so readers can spot the same traps in their own feeds.
How this fits with other research
Keenan et al. (2023) widen the lens: across 21 European countries, behavior analysts still lack legal title and BACB badges are no longer issued to non-U.S. residents. The French Reddit chatter is one slice of that bigger identity struggle.
Turner et al. (2016) sketched a supervision cycle built on ethics and competency. Turgeon’s audit shows why that cycle matters online—supervisees need help translating those same ethics to Twitter, Reddit, and TikTok.
Gül et al. (2026) ran a similar check on YouTube autism clips and also found poor quality. Together, the two papers warn that open-web autism content often fails basic reliability and ethics checks.
Why it matters
If you train staff or post online, take ten minutes today. Open your last month of social-media comments. Compare each one to the 2022 BACB Code sections on public statements, confidentiality, and respectful language. Delete or edit anything that drifts over the line. Model this audit for supervisees and ask them to do the same. Clean public talk protects clients and lifts the field’s reputation.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The Behavior Analyst Certification Board (BACB) released the third iteration of ethical practice guidelines for certificants, which went into effect on January 1, 2022. This Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts (hereafter Ethics Code) is streamlined and more enforceable than its predecessors, with the continued overarching directive to improve consumer protection. In the decades after the BACB was founded, the internet and social media have become ubiquitous in daily life, including within applied behavior analysis (ABA). Social media can benefit ABA stakeholders by providing access to enhanced professional networks, practitioner resources, and study guides or social support for behavior analysis students. However, the use of social media leads to a potentially increased risk of ethical concerns. Therefore, the authors of this article sought to explore how behavioral products in ABA social media forums on Reddit align with the Ethics Code. Findings suggest that most user engagement in ABA subreddit is ethical, but users also engage in ways that potentially misalign with the Ethics Code. Finally, the authors describe implications for future research and practice to promote ethical user engagement online by ABA practitioners.
Behavior and Social Issues, 2021 · doi:10.1007/s42822-021-00057-z