Navigating the Ethical Concerns of Facilitated Communication

If your social media consumption is anything like mine, you've likely seen some feel-good stories in the media as of late that report on non-speaking students - generally students with Autism - who are graduating from college, giving valedictorian speeches, and so forth. 

Unfortunately, what's often underpinning many of these cases is a form of Facilitated Communication, or FC for short. What is FC? Glad you asked!

In today's episode, Dr. Jason Travers, Associate Professor at Temple University, joins me today to answer this very question (follow him on Twitter here). 

We covered the history of Facilitated Communication, the early scientific investigations that discredited this practice, FC's variants like the Rapid Prompting Method and Spelling to Communicate, where the practice of FC stands today, the harms that Facilitated Communication causes both users and caregivers, and how Behavior Analysts should both view and talk about these practices. 

Jason also provides the audience with a treasure trove of additional resources:

• Jason's Research Gate and Google Scholar pages.
• Facilitatedcommunication.org 
• ASHA Policy Statements on Facilitated Communication and Rapid Prompting Method.
• Facilitated Communication—what harm it can do: Confessions of a former facilitator (Boynton, 2012).
• An Examination of the Role of the Facilitator in “Facilitated Communication” (Shane and Kearns, 1994).
• Ideomotor Effect explained.
• The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (note: Amazon Associated link).
• Skeptic Magazine (Amazon Associate Link); The Skeptical Inquirer. 
• The Reading Wars.
• Facilitated Communication: The Clinical and Social Phenomenon (Shane 1994; Amazon Associate Link).

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