Frequently Asked Questions About Community-Centered and Culturally Grounded Behavior Analysis

1. What does 'we over me' mean in the context of behavior analysis?

The concept of we over me refers to a shift from individualistic, practitioner-centered approaches to community-centered, relationship-based approaches in behavior analytic practice. Rather than the behavior analyst acting as a sole expert who defines problems and prescribes solutions, the we over me framework positions the practitioner as a collaborative partner who works alongside community members to co-identify priorities, co-design interventions, and co-evaluate outcomes.

This shift recognizes that individuals exist within families and communities whose knowledge, values, and resources are essential to effective intervention. It also challenges the power dynamics inherent in traditional expert-client relationships and advocates for genuine reciprocity and shared decision-making in professional engagement.

2. How can objectivity create harm in behavior analytic practice?

Claims of objectivity can create harm when they mask the cultural assumptions embedded in assessment and intervention practices. When a behavior analyst claims to be objectively assessing behavior, they may fail to recognize that their operational definitions reflect culturally specific norms, their interpretation of behavioral functions is shaped by their own cultural background, and their selection of target behaviors may prioritize conformity to dominant cultural standards over the client's genuine wellbeing.

Additionally, the claim of objectivity can deny the power dynamics inherent in the practitioner-community relationship, dismiss community knowledge as subjective or unscientific, and reproduce historical patterns of exploitation in which outside experts extract data from communities without genuine benefit. Acknowledging these dynamics does not require abandoning systematic measurement but rather being transparent about its limitations.

3. What are Protocols of Engagement and how can behavior analysts apply them?

Protocols of Engagement are frameworks for entering and working within communities that prioritize relationship-building, reciprocity, and authorized participation. Drawing from practices such as Ho'oponopono, these protocols emphasize seeking genuine invitation before engaging, understanding and respecting the community's own structures and decision-making processes, maintaining balance through reciprocal benefit rather than extractive engagement, and participating in community practices only when authorized and in the manner specified by the community.

Behavior analysts can apply these principles by investing time in relationship-building before conducting assessments, seeking guidance from community leaders about appropriate ways to engage, ensuring that their work produces tangible benefits for the community, and being transparent about their methods, motivations, and limitations.

4. How does community-centered practice differ from standard community-based ABA?

Standard community-based ABA typically refers to delivering behavioral services in community settings such as schools, homes, and community programs rather than in clinic settings. The service delivery location changes, but the fundamental model of an outside expert assessing, planning, and intervening remains the same.

Community-centered practice goes further by positioning the community as a genuine partner in every aspect of the work. The community helps define priorities, contributes knowledge to assessment and intervention design, participates in outcome evaluation, and ultimately owns the results of the engagement.

The difference is not about where services are delivered but about how power, knowledge, and decision-making are shared between the practitioner and the community.

5. How can storytelling and ceremony contribute to effective behavioral interventions?

From a behavioral perspective, storytelling and ceremony function as verbal and social behaviors that establish shared contingencies, build trust, and create setting events for productive collaboration. Storytelling allows community members and practitioners to share perspectives, build mutual understanding, and establish common ground in a format that is culturally familiar and emotionally resonant.

Ceremony creates structured, symbolically meaningful interactions that signal respect, commitment, and reciprocity. These practices create the relational context within which genuine collaboration becomes possible and within which community members are more likely to engage authentically with professional services.

Dismissing these practices as unscientific overlooks their functional value in establishing the conditions for effective intervention.

6. What does reciprocity look like in behavior analytic community engagement?

Reciprocity in community engagement means that the exchange between practitioner and community produces genuine benefit for both parties. For the community, benefits might include improved skills and knowledge among community members, data and resources that the community can use for its own purposes, strengthened community capacity to address its own needs, and respectful engagement that honors the community's cultural identity.

For the practitioner, benefits include deeper contextual understanding, access to community knowledge that improves clinical effectiveness, and meaningful professional relationships. Reciprocity also means that data collected in the community are shared with the community, that community members are credited for their contributions, and that the community has input into how findings are used and disseminated.

7. How do I balance professional expertise with community knowledge in clinical decisions?

Balancing professional expertise with community knowledge requires recognizing that each source of knowledge contributes something the other cannot. Professional expertise contributes knowledge of behavioral principles, evidence-based practices, systematic methodology, and ethical standards.

Community knowledge contributes understanding of cultural context, historical experience, local resources, relationship dynamics, and the lived reality of the issues being addressed. In practice, this balance means involving community members as genuine partners in assessment and goal setting, deferring to community expertise on cultural and contextual matters, applying professional expertise to design interventions that are both evidence-based and culturally congruent, and resolving disagreements through dialogue rather than professional authority.

The best outcomes emerge from genuine integration rather than dominance of either perspective.

8. What ethical obligations do behavior analysts have when working with communities that have experienced research exploitation?

Behavior analysts working with communities that have experienced research exploitation have heightened ethical obligations under the BACB Ethics Code (2022). Code 1.01 requires truthfulness, which means being transparent about the purpose, methods, and potential outcomes of engagement.

Code 1.07 requires cultural responsiveness, which includes understanding the community's history with professional engagement and its effects on trust. Code 2.09 requires involving stakeholders, which in this context means ensuring that the community has genuine decision-making power.

Additionally, behavior analysts should proactively address the legacy of exploitation by explaining how their approach differs from past experiences, providing concrete evidence of reciprocity and benefit, establishing community oversight of the engagement, and being willing to modify or discontinue their involvement based on community feedback.

9. How can I apply the tension between objectivity and transparency in my daily practice?

Apply this tension by practicing radical transparency about the cultural lens through which you work. When writing assessment reports, acknowledge the cultural assumptions embedded in your assessment tools and interpretations.

When presenting data to families and teams, be honest about what the data capture and what they miss. When selecting intervention targets, explicitly discuss the values and priorities that inform your recommendations and invite families and community members to share their own.

When evaluating outcomes, include community-defined indicators alongside your behavioral measures. This transparency does not undermine your scientific credibility.

It enhances it by demonstrating a sophisticated understanding of the relationship between measurement and context, and by building the trust that makes genuine collaboration possible.

10. What does authorized invitation mean and why is it important for behavior analysts?

Authorized invitation means that a behavior analyst's engagement with a community is initiated or explicitly welcomed by the community through its recognized leadership or decision-making structures, rather than being imposed by external agencies or assumed based on professional credentials. This concept is important because communities have the right to determine who enters their spaces and on what terms.

When behavior analysts enter communities without authorized invitation, they risk reproducing colonial dynamics of imposed professional authority, encountering resistance that undermines intervention effectiveness, and causing harm by failing to understand community protocols and sensitivities. Seeking authorized invitation demonstrates respect for community autonomy, establishes the relational foundation for genuine collaboration, and increases the likelihood that the engagement will produce outcomes that the community values and sustains.