Inside Behavior Analysis
Volume 2 | 2010 | Number 2
Chinese ABA
By Yanqing Guo
In 2009, Chinese ABA still focused its attention on helping children with autism and their families. In this year, we held three workshops for training parents on applied behavior analysis (ABA) techniques. These workshops included three parts: ABA principles and their applications in daily life, teaching models that are usually used in special education for children with autism, and how to teach children within a family or social setting. We also visited some of the special institutes and schools that provide education and training programs for children with autism. The purpose of these visits was to share our understanding of the application of ABA, but also to exchange ideas with the schools about their methods and rationale. We are in the second year of ABA courses at Peking University; more and more students select and show interest in the program, which is a general introduction to the application of behavioral principles. However, Chinese ABA membership did not increase, in part because we canceled the expected First Chinese ABA Conference due to lack of financial support. We hope to hold this event in 2010.
In the future, we hope ABAI will support memberships to young scholars who come from countries like China, for although it is experiencing amazing economic growth, the nation is still far behind the rest of the world in acceptance and use of applied behavior analysis. What is most troubling is the fact that few people understand ABA and are concerned about this lack of knowledge.