Association for Behavior Analysis International

Mental health and chronic invisible illness are issues that many practitioners deal with on a daily basis, yet little emphasis on having a discussion around these occur in the field of applied behavior analysis. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration reported in 2021, that “57.8 million people in the United States suffer from mental health conditions” and the American Hospital Association says that 133 million American’s suffer from “at least one chronic illness”. Based off this information, we can easily conclude that there are practitioners in the field of applied behavior analysis are not immune from these statistics. Unfortunately, these labels can be stigmatizing on a number of levels. At times, many with mental health and/or chronic illnesses may experience judgement on the ability to practice effectively by employers, clients that they serve, and colleagues. This panel discussion will focus on defining mental health illness, chronic illness and how to navigate removing the stigma around practitioners with mental and chronic illnesses. Concepts that will be explored will be: learning self-compassion by clinician’s with identified mental and/or chronic illness, advocacy in the workplace using the American’s with Disabilities Act to set accommodation’s, creating work-life balance, and boundary setting using tools such as the ACT matrix.

Prerequisite skills should include: foundations in acceptance and commitment therapy and self-monitoring.