..., I imagine that it would be important (or at least helpful) to make actionable recommendations which can be implemented or addressed by a BCBA. I'm sure
@ClinicalABA can speak more to this point though.
I appreciate the call-out, but- despite my username- don't want to set myself up as an expert on the topic. However, i do have a bit of experience with this stuff
😉
In my work diagnosing toddlers with ASD, I think you'd be remiss to not recommend ABA (It's basically the only game in town as far as specialty early intervention/birth-to-three services go, with the exception of some questionable "floor-time" programs in my area). I do think if you are going to recommend it, you should have a rudimentary sense of what it is/ is not. If you are going to work in the clinical service delivery field with young children with ASD, you really can't avoid ABA. Whether you support it, are against it, or somewhere in-between, you should be reasonably informed of what you speak. See
@futureapppsy2 post for some, imho, well informed and largely accurate criticisms of ABA (though some of her criticisms may be a bit geographically biased).
As to the OP- I'm an example of someone who currently works almost exclusively in ASD, but does not currently provide any ABA services to clients. Within my department of psychologists, about half of us are BCBA certified, but the others aren't. I did not take any graduate level ABA courses when doing my clinical Ph.D. (though I did take some great experimental analysis of behavior courses that informed my psych practice, including a great one on fear conditioning and anxiety). There is actually a strong trend for stand alone ABA departments, separate from psychology. It's a distinct field with it's own credentialling and licensure, so unless you go looking for it, it's likely that your psychology graduate training may not involve any formal study of ABA.
As far as studying ASD in graduate school, you may find that a lot of the research in done outside of clinical/counseling programs. It comes from labs in development, education, psychiatric, and even public health (though with a lot of the scientifically sound treatment research coming from ABA programs). There really is a great need for greater understanding of therapeutic techniques and outcomes with older children and adults with an ASD diagnosis. I like thing's simple and straightforward, so I stick with the largely non-verbal little kiddos, where the focus i largely on teaching foundational attention and communication skills (for which ABA can work extremely well, if done correctly). It's a little tougher to find clinicians for older kiddos with ASD who display the full range of adjustment problems and "axis 1" stuff as non-ASD clients. While I don't do that kind of work, i would think that understanding the difference between, say, repetitive behaviors that are positively reinforced by sensory feedback vs. those that are negatively reinforced by escape from unpleasant thoughts would be crucial for those doing CBT for anxiety.
Long story short, there's lots of opportunities (and need) for non-ABA study of ASD treament related topics. In may, in fact, be the mode approach outside of pure ABA programs. If you want to expand outside of therapy/applied stuff, there's even more exciting and necessary research being done/to be done. Stuff on gender and cultural differences, life span stuff (HUGE cohort effects and early identification and therapy become increasingly prevalent), romantic and sexual relationships, workplace related stuff. sub-clinical presentations in siblings, etc., etc., etc. As others (and maybe even I) have mentioned earlier, do some lit searches and I'm sure you'll discover lots of interesting stuff. Do, however, be cautious with assumptions and blanket statements about an entire field about which you may not have a lot of accurate information. It's certainly ok to say you that you're not interested in ABA (most people aren't, and it can be pretty dry stuff at least academically), it's less ok to propagate uninformed myths or present opinions as facts. Good luck in your endeavors, OP!
