The weight of harm: A Response to “Editor’s Note: Societal changes and expression of concern about Rekers and Lovaas’ (1974) Behavioral Treatment of Deviant Sex-Role Behaviors in a Male Child”
Pull Rekers & Lovaas (1974) from teaching and citations because it violates today’s ABA ethics.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Johnson (2022) wrote a reply to the journal’s 2021 note of concern about Rekers & Lovaas (1974).
The paper is a short, sharp call to fully retract the 1974 study that tried to stop a boy’s feminine play.
What they found
The author shows the 1974 paper still shows up in reading lists and citation chains.
Keeping it in print breaks today’s BACB ethics code that bans conversion-type goals.
How this fits with other research
Hantula (2022) also questions the BACB code, but from the other side—saying the code hurts OBM work. Johnson (2022) uses the same code to justify retraction, showing the code can both protect and constrain.
Zane (2025) tells clinicians to reject spelling-to-communicate for lack of evidence. Johnson (2022) mirrors that stance: reject historical work that lacks ethical evidence.
Hickey et al. (2021) urge researchers to measure harm in autism screening. Johnson (2022) applies the same harm lens to a young learners paper, arguing the field must erase, not just note, past damage.
Why it matters
If you train RBTs, supervise students, or build bibliographies, drop the 1974 Rekers & Lovaas paper. Swap in modern studies that affirm gender diversity and follow current ethics. Your reading list teaches values louder than any lecture.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
In 1974, Rekers and Lovaas published an article in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA) wherein the authors coached a 4-year-old child’s parents to ignore and physically abuse him when he engaged in behaviors that were identified by the authors as inappropriate for a child whose sex assigned at birth was male. In October 2020, a Statement of Concern regarding Rekers and Lovaas (1974) was published in JABA (SEAB & LeBlanc, 2020), which described concerns regarding the paper and then provided justification for the journal’s decision to not retract this paper. In this current response, I provide a counterpoint to the Statement of Concern, arguing that (a) the available evidence strongly suggests that the original study was unethical and misaligned with the principles of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), and (b) the evidence presented to support its contemporaneous ethicality is insufficient. I end with an argument that Rekers and Lovaas (1974) should be retracted and discuss the critical role of ethics and social significance for the field of ABA.
Behavior Analysis in Practice, 2022 · doi:10.1007/s40617-022-00683-y