Shared Joy Before Data: A Discussion with Dr. Megan DeLeon Miller, Part II

Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_03 (00:10):
Welcome to ABA OnTAC, where our goal is to find
the best recipe to food thesmoothest, coldest, and best
tasting ABA or out.
I'm Dan Lowry with Mike Rubio,and join us on our journey as we
look back into the ingredientsto form the best concoction of
ABA on tap.

(00:32):
In this podcast, we will talkabout the history of the ABA
food, how much to consume toachieve the optimum buzz while
not getting too drunk, and therecommended pairings to bring to
the table.
So without further ado, sitback, relax, and always analyze
responsibly.

SPEAKER_02 (00:51):
All right, all right.
Welcome back to anotherinstallment of ABA on tech.
I am your ever-grateful co-host,Mike Rubio, and this is part two
of our intriguing interview withDr.
Megan DeLeon Miller.
Enjoy.

SPEAKER_00 (01:08):
Yeah.
And I really don't know like100% that the more data, the
better is true when we look atthe research, especially for
autism.
I'm not, I mean, it could besomething else, but like for the
type of service that needs toexist with that shared
experience and reallyauthentically, genuinely being
responsive to your clients, it'simpossible to have a ton of data
to do that well.

(01:28):
But the data we like the data wetake needs to matter and we need
to make decisions based off ofthat data and still have a
process in place for that.
But even if we only I'm notsaying to do this, but my guess
would be even if we only tookdata once a week, maybe you even
like video record and you lookback, right?
Yeah.
You're going to see if if from afidelity standpoint the people

(01:50):
are setting things up the waythey should be, then you're
likely to see much more progressthan if you're, you know, being
super rigid and regimented abouttaking, you know, I know
companies will promote, like,oh, if you get 100 trials in per
session, you like win a prize orsomething.
It's like, I'd rather have likefive quality data points in the

(02:11):
session and be able to observethat you had some really good
connected experiences with yourclient than see a hundred data
points.
Because if you got a hundreddata points, I guarantee you
your interactions were notquality.

SPEAKER_02 (02:22):
Dan literally took data sets and took extensive
data sets and then would pickevery other data point or every
third data point and thendemonstrate in training to our
staff the difference in thosecurves, which was minimal.
But we just had these die hardBCBAs who were like, nope, no, I
mean, and you did such a goodjob of literally parsing it down

(02:43):
because now I'm gonna take everythird data point, now every
fourth.
Did it did this curve reallytell us anything different than
having every single one?
And they were convinced it did.
And it's like, look at it.
No, it it no, look at the trendline.
I mean, it's almost exact.
And but you know, it's so hardto get away from that notion
that we can be so precise.
And I like the way you saidstatistically it might be better

(03:04):
to have all the data points, butagain, if it's compromised your
interaction at all, then you'vegot something different there.
But the idea that somebodyvideotaped you or somebody
sitting there and taking thedata, or like we tell our you
know staff, uh, if you see akiddo twice a week, teach one of
the days, and then maybe theother day you take the data.
And better yet, the day that I'mthere with you, I'll take the

(03:26):
data.
You just interact.
And that I think that makes alot of sense.
We we definitely appreciate yousaying that here on ABA on Talk.

SPEAKER_04 (03:33):
You you asked that question too, the blasphemous
question.
What if we only took data once aweek?
I remember you asking thatquestion.
I'm blaming it on you.

SPEAKER_02 (03:42):
I don't need any more trouble.

SPEAKER_04 (03:43):
Okay, it is interesting though, like you
said, and and like Megan said,that if you look at schools,
right?
Schools teach, teach, teach,then test.
And ABA was always like teachand test at the same time.
And how many times do we need totest?
How many times do we need tostick this thermometer into this
turkey to realize it's notcooked yet?
Like, can we can we give alittle bit of time to let the
turkey cook rather than okay,not cooked, still not cooked,

(04:05):
still not cooked, still notcooked.
Like at some point, and thenlike Megan said, too, with the
data, I would say that a lot oftimes there is too much data
because what happens is you getsatiated to the data.
There's too much, people don'tknow it doesn't have the great
value anymore, and people don'teven know what to do with it any
anymore because you're losingthe value.

SPEAKER_02 (04:23):
So, yeah, you get another three-inch binder after
then you get a central reader.
Put it on some shelf.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (04:29):
Can I close out one thought on the health insurance
piece?
So again, I think the biggestthing, what's interesting is
when people give me pushbackabout like especially the social
communication, when you look atfor autism specifically, the
DSM5 diagnosis, it's way easierto tie in social communication
goals and a social communicationfocus to the diagnosis and

(04:52):
medical necessity than any ofthe things in any of our other
assessments.
Like it just blows my mind.
I'm like, why not?
What if if you truly are makingit based off of the diagnosis
like we're supposed to be, andaligning it with the DSM 5,
every single one of your goalsshould be tied to social
communication.
And maybe with the exception ofa few, depending.

(05:13):
But generally speaking, theyshould all somehow that's how
you get a diagnosis.

SPEAKER_02 (05:17):
Like so you're you're saying autism is a social
communicative disorder, Dr.
Moon?

SPEAKER_00 (05:22):
Isn't that wild?

SPEAKER_04 (05:23):
No, we literally had to do that with uh with a
peer-to-peer reviewer.
And it was interesting becauselike social communication and
the goal was kind of like inbetween, but it had like
language in it.
And she was like, Why is thatnot communication?
We're like, Oh, we could takethis, we could move it from
social to communication.
It doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_02 (05:40):
Yeah, which which domain do you want me to put it
in?
I'll rewrite it because it's andagain, I think that's maybe we
can talk about this a littlebit.
I you're you're sort of uhalluding to it without speaking
to it directly, but we we'vewe've almost we're almost too
good at our task analysis, Ithink, in ABA.
We almost break things apart toofar, and then putting them back
together gets a littledifficult, and then we get

(06:01):
caught up in, well, that shouldbe in this domain, and that's
addressing this.
To your point, Dr.
Megan, it's all connectedsomehow.
We just have to learn how thathow that is.
So I don't know if you have anythoughts on that.

SPEAKER_00 (06:12):
Well, it's funny, I think it what's interesting is
we break certain things down sofar, and then there's other
things that we've justcompletely ignored that are
actually so like again when wewere talking about with manding,
like people want to just jump inand start with manding, but
they've done nothing withpre-communicative social
communication type skills.
So it's like, well, we haven'tbroken that down far enough.

(06:34):
And actually, if you did all ofthe little steps we have for
manding, you probably wouldn'teven need because you'd have the
foundation built and everythingelse, generally speaking, for
most kids would come onlinebecause we've put the foundation
in in the first place that wasmissing.

SPEAKER_02 (06:48):
You you made me think about something just now
that I've been contemplating.
I'd love your take on it.
What about hand leading?
Hand leading is, I feelhistorically, such a
controversial little thingbecause it seems to be that a
lot of the kiddos we treat dothat, so people almost
misperceive it as a problem.
But yeah, what's your I mean,that's socially communicative.

SPEAKER_00 (07:09):
We call that that's part of the ADOS and it's using
the person as a tool.
Okay, okay, I think what you'resaying is around to like get
something, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 (07:18):
Or even just uh going to you know, grab a parent
with no verb, no vocal over,right?
Which again, I think is a littlediagnostically relevant and then
developmentally also veryrelevant.
Yeah, I'll let you explain that.

SPEAKER_00 (07:29):
Yeah.
Well, I think for that, it tiesback in with what we were
talking about earlier, withlooking at, you know, demanding
and tacting and socialcommunication and really needing
to connect with what how thisperson shows up.
So if it's hand leading, or Iknow a lot of children who use
their body to communicate.
Sometimes they don't do it in asafe way, but you watch their

(07:49):
body and it's like they're notusing gestures or signs, they're
physically moving their bodytoward things or away from
things.
They might be eloping, theymight, I call it bullying, not
to mean like as a negative term,but it just looks like they're
bullying their way throughstuff, like they're just like
doing this kind of thing to likeget to what they want.
And they're communicating somuch.

(08:10):
But instead of noticing that andaffirming and honoring that,
even if it's unsafe at first, wecan still acknowledge it and
shape it into something safer,but we tend to ignore it
completely.
We don't give it any sort ofrecognition, and we're like, no,
you have to communicate likethis.
Could you imagine being in aforeign country, not knowing the
language and using hand leadingor using your body and having

(08:34):
people just be like, like, Idon't know, I'm not helping you,
right?
Like that would be sofrustrating.
But we do that to our clientsall the time, where it's like,
well, the way you'recommunicating isn't good enough.
And we put the responsibility onthem instead of acknowledging
and connecting with what they'redoing that comes up for them
naturally, and then using thatto shape not because the way

(08:55):
they're communicating is wrong,but because if we can shape it
into something that more peopleunderstand, then they can get
their needs met and likenavigate the world in a safer
way.
But ultimately, I hope at somepoint, these other forms of
communication, like hand leadingor using their body or whatever,
people will be more affirmingof.

(09:17):
So it's like, oh, we don't evenhave to teach other people
because everyone understandsthat some people just
communicate this way and that'sokay.

SPEAKER_02 (09:24):
I mean, you know, it's maybe a little less, a
little more unsafe, but youcould make the same argument for
a young child with biting, forexample.
Is that fair to say?
Would you would you say thatfits a category of some level of
social communication?

SPEAKER_00 (09:37):
Biting sometimes it's like both there's the
there's like a sensory piecethat comes up.
Like a kid gets so excited or somad, and they're just this like
physical urge to like bitesomething for whatever reason.
I don't know.
Squeeze their fists, sure.
Yep.

SPEAKER_02 (09:50):
Or the stiffening when kids have tantrums, they
stiffen their body.
I think it's all very similar.

SPEAKER_00 (09:55):
There's like that physical piece to it.
So again, it's the same idea.
We can acknowledge oh, this iswhat you're trying to
communicate right now, like thisis the meaning that I can
observe from what you're doing.
And when you're and then itmakes it easier to explicitly
teach, you know, okay, next timeyou're feeling too excited,
here's a safer thing that we cantry to do, or here's like a

(10:16):
pillow you can bite on, orsomething.
Like if there that, you know,yeah, motivation is so high to
engage in the the thing thatmight not be that safe, we can
make it safer.

SPEAKER_02 (10:24):
So the idea is we we allow, we accommodate, we allow
for the behavior, but we positit such that it doesn't have a
negative impact on theenvironment.
That's kind of what you'resaying.

SPEAKER_00 (10:34):
Yeah.
And then my big piece with that,sorry, is that a lot of people
try to just wait until themoments happen, but the more we
can practice in like neutraltimes and build up fluency with
the replacements, because a lotof people think you can just
write a replacement on paper andit'll just magically happen.
Yeah, like oh, our replacementfor biting is that they'll clap
their hands, which doesn't evenmake sense because they're not

(10:55):
even related.

SPEAKER_02 (10:55):
So that's that's why you put it in the goal, though,
right?
Once you write it in the goal,it happens.
Like the child is not speaking,the child will speak 50 words.
Voila, right?
You don't have to write it inthe goal.
Dr.
Megan, you've you're causing alot of controversy on our show.
We appreciate it though.
One more question, I think whatand and trying to differentiate
these things that we'vediscussed, but you're lending
much more nuance.

(11:16):
You've talked about shiftinggaze, which I love.
And a long time ago, we werevery focused on eye contact.
What's the difference?
How do they work together?
Give us your insight on that.

SPEAKER_00 (11:31):
So the this is another one that comes down to
like function and topography.
Yeah.
So gaze shifting is like weshift our gaze for multiple
reasons.
If something without a personcould happen in the environment
and we're gonna shift our gaze,like, what was that sound?
Or what's that new thing thatjust came in?
And we're we're orienting oureyes in whatever you know

(11:53):
direction we need to.
We can do the same thing withpeople.
We're gonna gaze shift maybe tocheck in, or you'll see it even
with like little ones if they'rein a situation where they're not
they're starting to feel unsafeand they start like looking
around for their parents andlike checking.
Oh, is my mom still seemed calm?
Okay, I'm still calm.
And they, you know, there's thatsocial component to it.

(12:13):
So that's the functional pieceof gaze shifting, right?
Like that's what we need to beseeing.
It doesn't need to be I'm likedirectly staring into your eyes,
right?
But it's more of that orientingmy attention to whether it's
people or objects or whatever,versus eye contact.
Again, there's like this ideabecause well-meaning people,

(12:35):
well, before we understood allof this, noticed that people who
tend to make eye contact, likedifferent things are happening
for them.
So they that was, you know, agoal.
Obviously, that was initially ahuge focus, but again, that was
topographical.
Look at me, look at me.
You know, like that'stopographical.
There's no meaning behind it.
Why am I looking at you?

(12:56):
Right?
Like, if I'm just looking at youbecause you told me to, that
doesn't mean anything.
Like that doesn't mean anythingfor skill development.
And of course, we have autisticself-advocates who've said
looking someone directly in theeye, it can be very disorienting
and dysregulating for them.
So, like, why would we have thatas a thing that we're doing?
And they and then, especiallyfrom like a we're having a

(13:17):
conversation, let's look at eachother's standpoint.
They get so distracted.
Okay, I gotta look, I gotta makesure.
Is it been five seconds?
I got it, you know, and they'rethey're doing it again
topographically, instead ofreally looking at how do we do
this from a way that'smeaningful, that like the gaze
is going to shift as just afunctional part of the
interaction.

SPEAKER_02 (13:37):
So, what if I'm holding an MM by my I'm kidding.
Go ahead.
Yeah, we gotta do, we gotta goahead.
I know you got questions, Dan.
I'm gonna let you loose again.

SPEAKER_04 (13:48):
Yeah, sounds good.
So you said initially kind ofyour first ABA-ish.
I don't even know if it was anABA experience, but you were
partnered or collaborating withan art therapist and a plate
therapist way back in the day.
Yeah.
So that being your first kind ofexperience into the field, do
you think that that shaped yourperspective rather than just
being a you know traditional,I'm gonna jump into the ABA as a

(14:10):
lot of people would do nowwithout having any of the
diversification?

SPEAKER_00 (14:14):
Yeah, it definitely helped a ton.
There were, I don't know, itseems like you guys had kind of
a similar model when youstarted.
So I was part of the early dayswhere you had like a family
would hire three to five peopleto come in and do their ADA
sessions for 40 hours a week.
And then there was a consultantthat would come like once a
month.

(14:35):
If we got observed, we werelucky.
So that one team out of the fourteams I had had the play
therapist and the art therapist.
Then I was on other teams, andlike one of the teams had like a
super rigid person that waslike, this is how we have to do
it, blah, blah, blah.
And I, and so I got to see thecontrast of you know, the
progress or not being madeversus the different

(14:58):
perspectives.
And that really impacted me alot.
Like the one, the little boywhere they had we had the play
therapist and the art therapist,he tried so much during the
first weekend, like the firstworkshop that he threw up.
Like I was shocked that theparents even wanted to continue
with therapy.
And I, you know, wonder to thisday where this little boy would

(15:21):
have gone if he had had allrigid people up in there, you
know, like his life experiencewould be so drastically
different.
Um, but thankfully, you know,especially it was the art
therapist was definitely muchmore like compassion and like,
oh, let's not put him throughthis.
And then when the platetherapist came in, she was like,
Why do we have a table andchairs in here?
He's clearly upset about that.

(15:42):
Like, okay, why don't we justsit on the floor and play with
him and like use shaping and allthe things?

SPEAKER_02 (15:47):
Wait a minute, sit on the floor.
Does that are you sure thatworks?
Well, that's why I said itwasn't ABA because didn't have
the table and chairs.
Yeah.
It really wasn't an IKEA tableand chairs.
That might have been the otherproblem that Dan tends to
identify.
Maybe gave you a little goahead, please.

SPEAKER_00 (16:02):
Oh, with that little boy, we use social stories and
he the amount of progress, hewas only two, but he was really
into books and had a lot ofthings that, you know, looking
back and knowing what I know nowabout neuroscience and emotional
regulation, there was just a lotof stuff causing him this, you
know, activating his nervoussystem.
And reading the books to himgave him that like expectation,

(16:24):
that predictability and thepractice with what to do
instead.
And we combined it with shaping,but we did it very behavioral
skills training.
I didn't know if that's what itwas called at the time, but you
know, we would read the book,practice, and like slowly put
him into whatever situation wascausing difficulty for him.
And it like broke my heart whenI went to grad school and had

(16:44):
professors or researchers beinglike, social stories are not
okay, like they're notresearch-based.
And I'm like, Well, I have whydon't you go tell that to this
little guy who has like ahundred social stories, and his
life would be completelydifferent if we hadn't done that
with him because he's whetherit, you know, just from his one
example alone, like it'seffective.

SPEAKER_04 (17:04):
For sure.
And then, you know, a lot oftimes in ABA we get kind of
stuck in our habits, right?
So we think about the socialstories of like the where
they're gonna be laminated, andyou know, my name is Johnny.
I don't like going to thedentist when I go to the
dentist, like those kind ofthings, but now even watching a
video or looking at a lot ofthings on YouTube can be the
next iteration of a social storyexplaining what a situation's

(17:26):
gonna be like in a much moremeaningful way to these
individuals, to any individuals.
I watch social stories all thetime.

SPEAKER_02 (17:31):
Yeah, I wonder how that works.
Carol Gray is is one of thosepeople in the field that I feel,
I mean, very effective with whatshe's done with social stories,
and then yet I feel like almostlike Pex, a lot of us just
haven't implemented those thingsthe way they were intended to be
implemented, so they miss.
Yeah.
And that's interesting.
And I also wonder with socialstories, I don't know if based
on the traits of autism, if wesort of discount the idea of or

(17:55):
the potential of observationallearning from a social learning
perspective, and that's why wesort of poo-poo them.
But no, I agree.
I uh it's one of my favoritethings to I mean, we're I'm
sharing a story, and the ideathat we've created these formats
for social stories, I'm veryappreciative of, and then I've
also been guilty of saying,well, most children's books are
social stories in some way.
So if you can engage with abook, now you're working on

(18:19):
communication and jointattention and social information
and all these things that, youknow, back to your point, we
task analyze, we piece thingsapart so much because it's
important from a developmentalperspective.
Now we're talking about makingsure that we don't take them
apart so far that they'redecontextualized.
And I think that's a reallyimportant piece.
As far as the working with aplay therapist, that must have

(18:40):
informed you so much beyond thisidea of SD response consequence,
right?
So the idea that somebody'sengaging a child, somebody's
playing.
Will you talk about that alittle bit more and what you had
seen in terms of a contingency,and then now what a play
therapist was turning that intowith regard to uh interaction?

SPEAKER_00 (18:59):
So the play therapist in it was more like
showing us how to just be morenaturalistic for, you know, just
again sitting on the floor.
He had a playroom downstairs, sojust kind of following his lead.
It's a lot of what we would seewith the naturalistic
interventions, like pivotalresponse, or early start Denver
model.
So there wasn't a whole lot liketo me that's different from the

(19:26):
those approaches.
And you know, that was more.
I think her her training as aplay therapist was more in like
from I think it was it waseither floor time or something
similar to that.
So it was just like again, itwas a lot more about connecting
with the child and just closelyobserving them and being able to
follow their lead and you know,make critical decisions like is

(19:50):
now the best time to try topresent a few instructions or
you know, all that kind ofstuff.
So now unfortunately with floortime, there isn't really,
there's still not research.
And that's it's reallyunfortunate because a lot of the
things with the developmentallybased therapies that came out,
kind of as like a pushbackagainst the more traditional low
boss approaches, they were onthe right track with a lot of

(20:12):
stuff.
So they never did the researchand they kind of stopped at the
level of just imitate the child,like that's gonna do everything.
Right.
They never really took itfurther than that.
So I'm grateful again to haveher model and like see that.
And she was also like in grad asshe was either in or was
planning to go to grad school inABA, and she ended up becoming a
BCBA as well.

(20:33):
So it was nice, like model of Idon't want to say this in like a
mean way, but sometimes ifsomebody came in with just the
training on like the floor timeor like play therapy, it might
have been too loose or like toofar away from what we would be
doing as a science.
It wasn't like that.
She was, you know, kind ofsynthesizing both things.

SPEAKER_02 (20:54):
So we've have I've current I'm currently on a quest
to find the balance between.
So traditionally we've talkedabout structured versus
unstructured and more play-basedor child-directed approaches
falling under this unstructuredcategory, which feels very
loose.
But the notion of child versusadult-directed.
And I think that's the balancethat we've been trying to strike
in terms of you come in verychild-directed, very play-based,

(21:17):
and then at some point we've gotto hit these targets, so to
speak, which now becomes muchmore adult-directed per se.
What is that balance?
And that's an ongoing question,and it's different for every
child, in my opinion.
But again, that's something thatwe've been exploring in terms of
when do you make that shift?
So you you truly pair or buildthat rapport, or whatever other
terms you want to apply to it,and then when do we know that

(21:37):
the child is ready to take moreinstruction, to receive it more,
to be receptive, so that we canbuild those skills uh
accordingly.
But that's a that's a toughquestion, and it I think we
agree.
It starts with us sort of takingtheir lead uh to some extent.

SPEAKER_04 (21:51):
So there's a there's an idea I want to explore, and
there's maybe a few offshoots ofit, but I think it's an
important concept.
So from the the conference thatwe had, right, there were some
people that were actually kindof more in the academia side of
things, you know, Dr.
Bailey, uh, maybe even more likeyourself, and there were some
people that were more in thelike direct delivery that owned
companies and were coming fromsome of the companies.

(22:13):
And it's always seemed likethere's a little bit of a chasm
between what goes on in academiaand what's actually going on
with Johnny down the street whenhe gets his ABA services.
And maybe that wasn't, maybe itisn't as great as I as I thought
it was.
So there were a couple of ideasthat I wanted to float to you,

(22:33):
and you can kind of pick andchoose whichever ones you want
to run to.
One is we have this idea, thisphrase we use, Mike and I, and
then at our company is takingABA from the lab to the living
room.
So that's one of it.
Sometimes I feel like we try to,or we feel like we try to
reenact the lab, and we don'thave that nearly that level of
experimental control insomebody's living room.

(22:54):
And sometimes by trying toreenact that lab, we just end up
putting a square peg to a roundhole.
So that one.
The second idea being that youtalked about that you went from
academia to starting your owncompany.
So I don't know if there wereany realizations that you had or
any challenges or any thoughtsthere.
And then the last one being thatit seems like in a lot of the so

(23:19):
you brought up private equityearlier, some of the bigger
companies that we've both comefrom and that ended up buying
our companies out, really Idon't want to say didn't care.
That's probably too strong, butthat's sure how it seemed about
what the current research was orwhat was actually going on.
It was just about like billablehours.
And I think that's kind ofpervasive, honestly, in this ABA

(23:42):
field of there are people doingthings that everybody, you know,
not everybody, but a lot ofthese companies are citing Lovos
from you know the 80s, and ohwell, we need 40 hours a week
because Lovos said we need it inthe 80s, and what here billable
hours, billable hours.
Like a lot of our clinicalmeetings, literally none of them
at our last company wereclinical at all.
So there was this chasm betweennobody would know what's going

(24:04):
on in academia because nothingwas talked about what was going
on in academia.
And I'm sure there's some reallygood stuff being done and some
really good research.
But if we could do 15-year-oldmethodologies but build three
more hours, the companies wouldbe much more happier doing that
than doing anything that'sinnovative.
So those are kind of my threethoughts.
I want to kind of pass it to youabout academia versus the kind

(24:25):
of infield and open the floor upto you.
I think this goes into the fifthhour.
That's why I wanted to get toit.
I think it's an importantconcept.
Great question.

SPEAKER_00 (24:36):
So, okay, the and you might have to remind me as
we go because I heard academiaand then got distracted.
So academia, but that's like ahot button thing for me.
I don't know if you guys if youall were on one of there was a
panel.
I don't remember if you all werethe moderators for that one, but
I always say that there is apractice to research gap.

(24:57):
It drives me to be to hearpeople say research to practice
gap.
And I know you didn't actuallysay that, but it's just wild,
like it shows the ivory tower,the like the pedestal that
research gets placed on andacademia gets placed on above
practitioners, which is wildbecause this field wouldn't
exist without practitioners, youknow.
But at the same time, when welook at an applied science, now

(25:21):
I'm not talking about EAB ortranslational necessarily, but
when you're looking at theapplied research that needs to
be done, how many researchersare actually going and
connecting with practitioners tofind out what the issues are
that we need to address for sureand then doing the research
accordingly.
They're not, but then they'recomplaining that they don't
think practitioners read theresearch, and it's like, well,

(25:42):
why would we if it's notfunctional and meaningful to
what we're doing?

SPEAKER_01 (25:46):
Yep.
Like that doesn't make anysense, you know?

SPEAKER_00 (25:48):
So, and I've I can't even tell you how many times
I've been to conferences andlike, you know, a researcher is
presenting on something that'simportant, and then I'll ask a
question from the practitionerlens, and they just scoff at me,
like, well, who are you to evenask?
Like, I'm a researcher, like,how dare you to question what
I'm doing?
And I'm like, okay.
I love Greg Hanley for the workhe's done because he's one of

(26:10):
the only people that's reallyembraced that idea of like he
had his he had hisresearch-based research.
And then when he finally likestarted doing
practitioner-focused stuff, herealized.
I mean, I I'm not trying tospeak for him, but this is my
observation.
It seems like he realized, like,oh, I knew nothing as a
researcher.
But is it not true?

(26:31):
He knew a lot.
But like, do you know what Imean?

SPEAKER_04 (26:32):
Like, it's a Dennon Kruger effect, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 (26:35):
Yeah, when you see the drastic change in the work,
he's always done amazing workand he's always done
compassionate work, but there'sstill like these huge shifts
that happen in the work thathe's done once he started doing
more with the practitioners thanwhen he was, you know, in more
of the silo of just academia.

SPEAKER_01 (26:53):
Okay.

SPEAKER_00 (26:53):
So I would love to see more researchers really
connect with, you know,practitioners and look at that.
You know, it should be there'sit should be going both ways.
Like it should be bi-directionalin how that's happening.
And then, of course, I wouldthink more practitioners would
be pulling in the research if itwas more aligned with like what

(27:14):
would help us do a better job.
But then that being said, asI've mentioned, there is
research that is in the fieldfor autism specifically right
now and neuroscience, likerelate fields related to
behavior analysis that peopleare completely ignoring because
they're going based simply onhow they were trained to
practice.
So there's, you know, there isthere are gaps in both

(27:37):
directions.
I just, it just drives me crazywhen people only talk about
research for practice.
So I think like again, beingstaying informed in whatever
population you work with aroundlike what what's the research
that's happening here would beideal, you know.

SPEAKER_04 (27:52):
That makes a lot of sense.
Yeah, it doesn't that's I thinkpart of the chasm, right?
It doesn't seem like it goeseither direction, and you're
saying, okay, that makes a lotof sense.
Continue.

SPEAKER_00 (28:01):
Yeah.
But and then then you just lookat the things that researchers
are sometimes arguing about tooin publications, and it's like,
are there not more importantthings that we could be doing
right now?
Like what is happening?

SPEAKER_02 (28:12):
Exactly.
Well, and the idea that um, Imean, sometimes it's it's a lot
about how things are learned orhow behaviors are changed, and
then the idea that there's aprotocol that comes out of that
that can actually be implementedis a whole separate question, I
think, is something you'respeaking to.
And we talked about thatreciprocal imitation paradigm
that came out of research.
I think that did a very good jobof presenting something that you

(28:32):
can actually replicate in yourpractice.
But yeah, I I think we can allagree it doesn't go both ways.
And yeah, a lot of times thearticles you read, it's like,
well, this I'm not sure when Iwould use this.
The language is very uhelevated, so it's already not
very attractive.
Uh there's a bunch of stats herethat I don't understand.
It's it's pretty hard.
But at the same time, we youknow we do understand the uh the

(28:54):
ivory tower elements of thatresearch.
It is very stirnuous, it is verydifficult to have to to maintain
grant funding, and there'scertain you know, pressures
around that.
So how to make that a friendlierexchange would be something very
interesting to continue toexplore.
Because it it should.
The research should inform us,and then to your point, Dr.
Megan, the research should beinformed by what we did with the

(29:15):
prior research toward their nextresearch endeavor.
So it it's it's a circle, it's acycle that doesn't exist right
now.
Or maybe in a very limitedfashion.
I I I haven't uh tapped intoanybody yet.

SPEAKER_04 (29:27):
I'll pass it back to you.
I know you had more to say onthat.

SPEAKER_00 (29:30):
Uh well, I mean, that's really like the big thing
for me from like the academiaside.
And I do think, again, I thinkthere's a piece where because
for academia, there's not arequirement necessarily to be
practicing in the fielddirectly.
And I think this is not uniqueto behavior analysis.
You would see this in med schooland like different, you know,

(29:50):
fields in general, like there'sthe people who are teaching, and
if they're not directlyproviding the service that
they're teaching about, there'sgoing to be a disconnect as
things change.
And I just like I hope tocontinue to see people be more
open to getting that, you know,feedback.
I I feel like we're seeing itshift.
That arrogance and that kind oflike, well, I know best because

(30:12):
I'm here at the university isshifting quite a bit.
But there's still like there isthis tendency for people to just
dig in on, you know, what theywere trained in and not be open
and curious to learn more about,you know, why we might shift.
Even when I when I first startedpresenting on Early Start Denver
model, like back when it firstcame out in 2010, I did a

(30:33):
presentation on it and I talkedabout some of the neuroscience
pieces that are in that.
And one of my like mentors waslike, we don't need to know
about neuroscience.
We're behavior analysts andeverything.

SPEAKER_01 (30:44):
Really?

SPEAKER_00 (30:45):
He's like, everything was great except for
that part.
And I'm like, oh my gosh,seriously.
Like, we need to know about allof it.

SPEAKER_02 (30:52):
I I mean, I might be off my game here, but I'm pretty
sure the the brain and spinalcord are antecedents to
behavior.
I'm just gonna put that outthere.
I'm pretty sure if you don'thave those, there's no behavior,
but that could just be me uhbeing uh blasphemous again.

SPEAKER_04 (31:08):
So what are your thoughts on the the lab
delivering room piece?
I think that's where a lot ofthe maybe excess data and stuff
like that comes into playbecause obviously in academia or
research, right, you have tohave a lot of data, you have to
have really high levels ofinternal validity and control
and things like that.
And you know, initially ABA wastaken kind of from that, so
there was you know a lot oftable and chair and no

(31:31):
distractions, and you have totell the parent to leave, and
there can't be anything on thewall because we have to make
sure our SD is the only SD, andit was really titrated down to
make sure that when we got adata point, we could replicate
that and that replicability.
And hope it seems like the fieldis going away from it.
At least I know we are.
I mean, I think maybe the fieldis a whole is, but what is kind
of your thought on that lab tothe living room piece?

SPEAKER_00 (31:55):
So yeah, that's the part I didn't talk about.
Your actual question.

SPEAKER_04 (31:59):
So well, I had many questions.

SPEAKER_00 (32:02):
The so that part I think I talk about this quite a
bit with people that there needsto be more done.
Again, we are an appliedscience.
And the way, like when peopleare going to grad school, you
know, I would say we're probablyat the point now where 99% of
them are going to be out in thefield practicing, they're not
going to be in a research lab,but still, the a lot of the

(32:24):
programs are still structured asif they're going to be
conducting research and peoplearen't being trained to know the
difference, right?
Okay, if you're doing a researchstudy, these things are true.
And when you're with a human,these things are true.
And even when you're doing aresearch study, you're likely
with humans.
So we need to be a little bitmore flexible there too.
But that's like a whole separatediscussion.

(32:45):
So when people are trained, youknow, that we have to have like
this very strict data collectionand these very like, you know,
strict procedures and all of thethings that like from a learning
history, reinforcement historystandpoint, their professors
have been conditioned as likethe most valuable things.
That's going to be problematicwhen we then go into a home, and

(33:07):
none of that is actually true.
And it could actually be in theopposite direction.
The more you try to do somethinglike it's a research study in a
person's home or school orcommunity, they're not going to
make the progress we would wantto see.
We need to be able to beflexible and make adjustments
and all of that kind of stuff.
So I think more needs to be doneat the training level, whether

(33:27):
it's supervision or universityprograms, to show that there are
two different things going onhere.
You know, like we need tounderstand how we do research in
a way that's ethical and humane.
And we need to understand how wecan take the science and use it.
My favorite example that I givewith this is not mine, but I did

(33:48):
a presentation with Dr.
Merritt Schenk, who was a BCBAat USF, and he studied baseball.
So he did his study was with alittle league team and working
with the pitchers.
And we presented at ABAI and hepresented his research.
And somebody asked a question orhe had it in his presentation, I
can't remember.
But basically, this idea of ourscience is incredible.

(34:09):
There's so many different thingswe could do with it.
And he had so many ideas of whathe wanted to do with this little
league team.
But he can't make the rules ofthe game, he can't change the
game.
So we had to think about how canI make the best use of the
science with the game I'm given,not the game I want to be
playing.
And I just think that likemetaphor is huge.

(34:30):
Like people need to be trainedto learn and be nimble enough
with our science to have it workwith the game they're given,
whether it's the family, theschool, the community, figure
out.
If you can't figure that out,then our science might as well
not exist.

SPEAKER_04 (34:44):
That's tricky, right?

SPEAKER_02 (34:49):
We we spend a lot of time teaching the rules of the
game.
You could probably be a betterumpire than player in that
sense.
It's the same with our RBTs,right?
You do this 40-hour classroomtraining and they pass this
competency exam, but at the endof it, they probably have no
idea how to run a session.
And again, both things arereally important, and and to you
that's what you're speakingabout is how do we make them
come together better?

(35:10):
Because we we're teaching theright things.
You need to know all the rulesof the game to play baseball,
but if you don't play baseball,you're not going to be a very
good player.

SPEAKER_04 (35:18):
For sure.
It's that balance, right?
Because if you stray too farfrom it has to be
individualized, much more so inthe home than it does the lab.
But if you stray too far fromit, then you're losing the
scientific validity.
So is the science still thescience anymore?
But if you try to replicate ittoo much, that's almost
impossible in the home.
So it is it is a challenge, andthat's just yeah, that's that

(35:41):
that kind of chasm that that Isaw, but it does seem like there
are a lot of people people outthere trying to bridge that,
which is which is good, likeyourself.
And and I think that third pieceis just the the motivation of of
companies to try to do betterservice and not just be more
fiscally uh doing betterfiscally, because that's the
other, but that's a whole notheryeah, that'd be our six of this

(36:04):
of this podcast.

SPEAKER_00 (36:04):
I'm gonna add one more thing.
Like, so the one of the things Ireally liked at Florida State
was they they did both for us.
So we would read articles abouta topic, right?
And they usually had like afoundational article that was,
you know, the first thingpublished on the topic, like one
of the first differentialreinforcement articles.
But then we would read a couplearticles that were new and like
recently published, and all ofour exams were scenario-based.

(36:28):
So it would be like you have aclient where X, Y, and Z is
happening.
How would you apply a articleand why?
And we had to, you know, ouranswer was looking at how to
take the information and make itrelevant to the scenario they
gave us.
And we couldn't just regurgitatelike every single step of a
study and be like, oh, I wouldjust, they did this and that's

(36:49):
what I would do.
We had to explain what parts ofit we would apply and why and
how it all comes together.
And I think the more whetherit's through supervision or
graduate work that people wouldincorporate that style of
knowledge application, we wouldsee more of that happening where
people can understand how tolike how much to replicate and

(37:10):
how much to to adjust that stillaligns with the science, but
would make sense for theindividual situation.

SPEAKER_04 (37:16):
Okay.
Speaking of uh making sense, gotto get to the uh the seven steps
of instructional control.
So I found out when we weremoderating the podcast that you
uh you had some input into thatarticle or you worked with uh
Dr.
Shram.
So I love this article.
Uh, check it out.
You can literally just Googleseven steps for instructional
control.
I use it in my parent groups.

(37:38):
Can you talk talk to that, thearticle, your how you got
involved with Dr.
Shram?
Like let me pass it to you forthat because thank you.
That's gotten me a lot.

SPEAKER_00 (37:48):
So I'll tell you the quick story.
When when I was first coming,moving to Virginia from Florida
State, I uh was on a lot ofmessage boards.
So back in the day there wereYahoo groups, and I was on the
Yahoo groups.
And I had a couple clients whenI was at Florida State that were
not responding to traditionalescape extinction procedures.

(38:11):
So I just, you know, used myknowledge of the science and
thought about, you know, whatwas going on for them and did
some analyses to figure out whatwas maintaining and what skill
deficits were there, and came upwith a procedure that was
basically the seven steps, but Ididn't, I had never read the
seven steps.
So somebody had posted on theYahoo group asking about like,

(38:32):
you know, they had a a child orsomething where escape
extinction wasn't working.
And I commented with like,here's my here's been my
experience when that doesn'twork.
This is what I did.
And Robert contacted me and hewas like, Where'd you come up
with that?
And I was like, My brain, Idon't know.
And he was like, Why, you know,wrote this thing, the seven
steps, you haven't read it.

(38:53):
And I was like, No.
This was he, I think hepublished the first book in
2008, and this was 2009.
So I hadn't encountered it yet.
When the funniest part is, rightaround that same exact time, I
was establishing my client basein Virginia, and I had a parent
reach out to me that had seenour exchange on the Yahoo group,

(39:13):
and she said, I just moved herefrom Germany, Robert was my
BCBA, and I'm hoping to have yoube my BCBA because we all seem
to do similar things.
So like super small world.
So we worked, I ended up workingwith that family.
But then once um Robert and Igot a chance to chat and
whatnot, and we met up at one ofthe ABAI conferences, I went to

(39:36):
his workshop and basicallystalked him a little bit.
And he was like, I'm gonna pickyour brain all night long.
He was like, Okay.
So we decided to start doingsome work together, and I
created this training packet andintegrity checklist, and I did a
little mini study in Virginiawith a center that was not using
the seven steps, and we showedthe effectiveness, you know, of

(39:58):
using the seven steps comparedto the current practice, which
was basically traditional escapeextinction, had amazing results
from it.
And then we just sort of kept,you know, doing stuff together
from there.
We're actually in the process ofrevamping, and we have been for
like two years because I keepgetting sidetracked.
We're like this close to beingdone, but I need a few, like a

(40:20):
few days in a row of severalhours to just knock it out.
So, as silly as this mightsound, I'm leaving for a cruise
on Friday and I've decided totry to make it like a working
cruise.
So I'm hoping it'll be my littleretreat to try to get it
finished.
But so back when the seven stepsfirst came out, we it was so
drastically different from whatpeople were doing with

(40:42):
traditional escape extinction.
And the whole idea was basicallyto create this, you know, fun
oasis of fun and just be super,super, super engaging, which
some people were doing thatalready.
But even when I watched Robertwas like his initial pairing
videos, I realized I have neverbeen trained like this.
And he's just a well, I don'tknow if it's naturally, but from

(41:03):
his learning history, he's asuper fun, motivating, energetic
guy.
So just I think whether it wasthe seven steps or anything
else, anyone ever watching hisearly trainings, you just felt
like you learned a ton aboutjust how to be like a fun
therapist or a fun behavioranalyst.
Which is so important.
Yeah.
So he like that part was huge,you know.

(41:24):
And then the whole idea of we'renot going to physically force or
use like nagging or anything,we're not going to keep
repeating ourselves.
We're just going to wait untilthe child's ready to engage
again.
And the thing that I think ismost important with the seven
steps, especially back then, washow we can make ourselves part
of the fun.

(41:44):
Because a lot of people werebeing told to pair to become a
walking MM, but they weren'treally being guided on how do we
make ourselves part of that funexperience.

SPEAKER_04 (41:53):
Isn't that step number two?
Make yourself fun.
Go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 (41:57):
Yep.
So I if I had it my way, like Itold Robert, I was like, when we
redo the seven steps, I think weshould make step two, step
number one, because it is themost important, but it's you
know, they are what they are.
So with the new seven steps, wehave done a lot to revamp it to

(42:19):
where we are looking at makingit more aligned with being
affirming.
So one of the things I toldRobert, you know, back when he,
you know, he published his bookin 2008, but we published a book
together with like the trainingpacket and everything.
We did that in 2012, I think.

(42:39):
So in that time, you know, we'vedefinitely learned and keep
doing better and all that kindof stuff.
And what I realized is a lot ofthe the like language and the
way it's written is more focusedon the parent and like
essentially kind of making theparent's life easier.
So so instead, we're working onreally updating the language to

(43:04):
be more affirming and honoringof the child's experience while
also supporting like the parentor the therapist.
So you guys can have the firstpreview here because we haven't
really put this out anywhere.
But so we updated the steps, andI'm just trying to pull up the
document where they're listed soI can tell you what they are.

(43:24):
We're calling it the seven stepsof instructional motivation now.
So the steps now are step one isyeah, step one is still
basically the same.
Identify and organize yourreinforcement.
Step two, that used to be havefun, is now build an authentic
relationship.
And again, it's focused more onshowing your child that you're

(43:45):
authentically there and likewith them and you're there to
support them and have fun.
Step three is how and when togive important instructions.
So we put a much bigger focus inthis one on like really closely
observing the child and choosingwhen to place demand based on
the child's priorities andvalues and not just like what

(44:07):
the adult wants to see.
Step four is to use positivereinforcement.
That one really hasn't changed.
But again, we've put in a littlebit more language around you're
not just like doing it like I'mtrying to withhold reinforcement
from you, so you'll do what Iwant you to do.
It's more again, closelyobserving and determining how

(44:27):
best to use the reinforcement tosupport the child.
Step five is the same too.
It hasn't really changed thatmuch to grow your expectations
over time.
Step six haven't changed,determine your priorities.
Step seven is the biggestchange.
So if you remember, step sevenwas basically like to shut down
the fun and and like use like aminor form of extinction where

(44:49):
we're not gonna make you do thething, but we're not really
going to sit here and engagewith you until you come back.
So now instead of that, it's totroubleshoot.
Because if you get to a pointwith step seven where the child
has left you, it's like nolonger choosing to participate,
then something in the first sixsteps is not going well.
Yep.

(45:09):
So it's more to stop and reflectand think about okay, what where
did I lose this?
Like, what do I need to be doingdifferently?
And like have it as a reflectionmoment instead of shutting down
the environment and trying towait for the child to come back
to you.

SPEAKER_04 (45:22):
That makes a lot of sense.
And that goes more towards, andwe use the term blanket
extinction.
You kind of talked about it withescape extinction, like you
know, historical ABA, right?
Shut down the fun.
If they're not doing what wewant, then we just don't do
anything until they do what wewant.
So it seems like kind of whatyou're saying is now we're
troubleshooting the situationand we're not completely
detaching, we're trying toproblem solve.

SPEAKER_00 (45:42):
Yeah, yeah.
So, and I it's just so funnybecause when when the seven
steps came out, again, it wasjust such a drastic change.
And people, you you obviouslyknow because you're one of them,
we're just like blown away,like, oh my gosh, this makes my
practice so much better.
And but then, you know, I goback and I read stuff now from
the book and I'm like, ooh, wesaid that.
Why did we say it like that?

(46:03):
You know?

SPEAKER_04 (46:04):
Let me let me ask you this question, and I've
really liked the changes.
I think that's awesome.
And I want one of those copiesas soon as it gets released, so
you gotta let me know where.

SPEAKER_02 (46:11):
He needs to re-wallpaper his office so
you're as soon as you can getthat manuscript or a copy of it,
he's gonna appreciate thatbecause now his office walls are
outdated with the old steps.

SPEAKER_04 (46:21):
Yes, and I I like I really like taking control out.
That again, that seems like moreof a affirming thing rather than
I'm gonna control somebody.
The the first step, identify anorganized reinforcement.
Do we run the risk of, and maybeit's just explained within
there, of with that phrasing,thinking that reinforcement is
more extrinsic because we'retalking about organizing it.

SPEAKER_00 (46:44):
Yeah.
So this is the Robert's languagemostly, but it's basically like
creating your environment in away that's organized and
beneficial for the child.
So this might mean for somechildren that things are
organized, like in the originalseven steps, where you might
have things in containers andyou know, all of that kind of

(47:04):
stuff.
It might mean that you just knowwhat your boundaries are and
what like especially for gearingit towards parents, like knowing
what types of things require youto sort of step back and say,
like, that's not safe.
We need to, you know, have ashift here.
And then knowing what types ofthings it's like we're gonna be

(47:25):
flexible and that kind of stuff.
So it's more focused on thatside of thing as opposed to like
extrins, extrinsic and intrinsicmotivation.
So it's more setting like thatorganizational view of what are
kind of our house rules and whatare the types of things that we
need to provide some moresupport and that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_04 (47:43):
That makes that makes a lot of sense.
I wonder if the wordreinforcement, because it's used
in a later step, would be betternot used in that step if we're
talking to parents.
Yeah.
So we can use a word that's morecomfortable.
And then we, as we explainthings, then we introduce it in
positive reinforcement.
That's my unsolicited two cents.

SPEAKER_01 (48:00):
I love your article.

SPEAKER_04 (48:01):
I'll tell Robert trying to run light advice over
here.

SPEAKER_02 (48:05):
And again, once we do, he needs several copies to
be able to redo his office.

SPEAKER_04 (48:10):
But thank you so much for doing that article.
That has really been alifesaver.
I've seen and and it says, Ithink there's a preface in there
before the steps that talksabout making it parent-friendly.
And it really is.
Like anybody who's listening tothis podcast who isn't
affiliated with Mike or Ionanyway, please check out this
article.
It really does connect the dotsin a way that if you do those
seven steps, you will see anincrease in what used to be

(48:32):
called instructional control.
Now, what do you call it?

SPEAKER_00 (48:36):
The seven steps to instructional motivation.
I have to give credit to uhVince Lamarca.
He's actually the one that waslike, wouldn't this be a better
way to call it?
Yes, it would, actually.
Thank you for that.

SPEAKER_02 (48:51):
I think that I think the word control is I I again, I
understand it academically.
I think it is problematic intranslation.
Uh and that the way you just putthat is is much better.
So the idea is we don't we'renot controlling anything.
We're we're influencingmotivation.
And and the more motivated thechild is to do what we're asking
them to do, then the better ourdata or whatever it is we're

(49:12):
we're after.
So that makes a lot of sense.
Time flies, I think you have abetter.
Yeah, so we need to we've you'vegot let's let's get to the let's
fast forward to the modern day.
Let's talk about do bettercollective.
I know you've got some eventsand some things that you're
working on currently.
Let's take this time to makesure we let people know about
those.
So, first things first, dobetter collective.
You've sort of alluded to it andand everything we can do better

(49:36):
throughout this uh almost twohours.
Tell us what you guys are doingcurrently, tell us a little bit
about the history, tell uswhatever you want to tell us
about do better.

SPEAKER_00 (49:44):
Okay.
So quick.
So basically, when I firststarted doing training, I when I
was presenting uh to tell peopleabout early start Denver model
and seven steps, I had this likeopening slide where I listed out
the various things I learned inmy early career.
And then I had a column thatsaid, like, how I learned to do

(50:05):
it better, basically.
Like, this is the way I didbetter.
And that sort of under was justlike an underlying theme for me.
That training was from like 2009or something, 2010, like a long
time ago.
And then I kept finding myselfgoing, whether I was supervising
people, I did a lot ofinternational supervision, I did
a lot of, you know, UnitedStates supervision too, teaching

(50:27):
college classes, whatever it wasthat I was doing.
I kept encountering situationswhere people weren't learning
all of the things I had had theprivilege of learning in my
career, whether it was at FSU orother avenues.
And I just kept saying, like, wecan do better, we can do better.
Like, why is it not better?
So I went to a training withRick Kubina in 2017, like the

(50:48):
end of the year, and he wasdoing his precision teaching,
you know, very inspirational,like the stuff he was talking
about.
And so many people in there werejust blown away.
And I just kept like, man, whyare we not here?
So that like night or something,I went home and I just wrote out
all of the different things thatI felt like I was constantly
having to teach people that wecould do better in our field,

(51:10):
that are integral parts of ourfield that exists and research
has been there, you know, butpeople just were not learning
about it.
So over 2018, I started what wecall the do better movement.
And I had like a differentwebinar each month, and it was
free and just to try to get likethis information out there to
people.
It was on things like behavioralskills training, functional

(51:31):
communication training, some ofthe advancements in early
intervention, like all sorts ofstuff that I felt like I just
learned, but other people werenot learning.
And then we just kept with thattheme.
So in 2021, we're actually aboutto celebrate our fifth birthday,
sorry, November of 2020.
We started the membershipcommunity.

(51:51):
So we'll have our fifth birthdayon November eighth, November
15th, and we're gonna be doingsome like special offerings for
that.
But so we've carried over this,we do a webinar every month
trying to bring in practitionersthat are doing you know better
things in our field and havethem share the work that they're
doing.
And then we have the onlinecommunity where people can

(52:12):
interact with each other, accessthe previous, like we have five
years, we'll have five yearsessentially plus of webinars.
Can we start it?
The 2018 webinars going forward,as long as they're still
relevant, are in there.
So we have a ton of, you know,70 plus different courses, and
we have meetings twice a monthwhere we share resources and we

(52:33):
put all the resources andrecordings from those meetings
in there as well.
And it's nice because thecommunity is made up of seasoned
behavior analysts, RBTs,parents, new behavior analysts.
So everyone can kind of cometogether and interact with one
another.
And like they're different,everyone's open, curious,
humble, like interacting justto, you know, elevate whatever

(52:54):
they're doing in the like in thefield.
So one of the things we startedlast year because I was getting
so frustrated with conferences,it's called rejected.
And the point of rejected is toreally platform and highlight
the work of practitioners in acomp, like a full conference.
So it's online.
We might do an in-person oneevery few years, but right now

(53:15):
it's online.
So our rejected 2025 conferenceis happening in December.
And the whole idea is there's norejection happening.
Like people, it's basicallyfirst come, first serve.
And as long as it meets the youknow values of our practice and
everything, they can present.

SPEAKER_04 (53:32):
And if you need an MC or there's anything we can do
for that, let us know.

SPEAKER_00 (53:37):
I'll let you know.
Yeah.
So we have a really cool likemix of practitioners this time
around.
Last year we did like I plannedit in like two weeks, and we had
like 30 presentations, and itwas a lot.
So this year we're only doing, Ithink it's 12, 14, 16, something
less than the 30 that we didlast year.
Okay, but it's a value like wedo initially have like a

(53:59):
values-based registration.
We try to keep everything reallycost effective.
All the presenters get paid forpresenting as well because we
want to make sure we'recompensating them for their
time.
And yeah, so that's happening inDecember.
And then we also started doingretreats.
I did the first retreat in 20,well, it was supposed to be
2020, but it got pushed to 2021.
But we call it couch to camp,and it's where we do some

(54:22):
learning online and then we allmeet together at a retreat in
person.
And our next retreat is inFebruary, and it's much smaller
now because I'm using a retreatspace here in Florida where we
can only have like about 15people.
So it's a really nice, likeintimate experience.
And we do a self-care day that'sfocused on just rejuvenating and

(54:44):
relaxing and getting reset.
There's a pool and like musicalinstruments and all of like a
path, a walking path, horses,goats, like it's just it's
really nice reset.
And then on the Sunday, we dothe learning, like we have CE
activities that we do, butthey're more workshoppy and like
we don't use PowerPoints, it'smore discussion and workshop

(55:05):
based.
So those are the two big thingswe're doing.
Oh, sorry, we have one more,three.
Perfect RBTs.
RBTs matter.
So we have we're finally doing a40-hour RBT training, and that's
gonna come out in 2026.
And my colleague Allison is aninstructional designer, so she's
using all of this really coolsoftware to design it in ways
that are more engaging andinteractive.

(55:26):
And we have a guy named Jack,and a lot of it is like the
story of Jack becoming an RBTand learning the different
concepts through Jack instead ofjust lecture based.
And then we're creating an RBTlibrary as well that's more
interactive and it'll haveexercises where you're engaging
with the content again and notjust listening to a lecture.

(55:47):
And that for now is part of ourbusiness membership.
So anyone who has a businessmembership gets free access to
those resources and it's freefor the RBTs.
So they pay for their BCBAs, butthey get free access for the
RBTs.

SPEAKER_04 (56:00):
That is so as somebody who is the RBT trainer,
well, even before it's an RBT,for probably the last 15 years
and 10 years at initially in thethe big company, like that is so
needed.
So thank you.
Because they often getforgotten.
So thank you for doing that.
That is absolutely amazing.

SPEAKER_02 (56:16):
Shout out to Allison.
Yeah who was who was on who wason our uh on our podcast.
Oh, it's a different Allison,probably.

SPEAKER_00 (56:23):
This is Alison Kim.

SPEAKER_02 (56:24):
Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 (56:25):
You probably don't know her, but you can't.

SPEAKER_02 (56:27):
Sorry, we can still yeah, we can shout out Allison.
You made a special design, itwas too much of a coincidence.

SPEAKER_04 (56:31):
Two thoughts as to what you said.
One, have you Dr.
Scott, what's his last name?
O'Donnell.
Dr.
Scott O'Donnell.
Are you familiar with Dr.
Scott O'Donnell?

SPEAKER_00 (56:39):
We're connected on LinkedIn, but I don't really I
haven't like interacted with himas much as I would like to.
I see his posts and and thenalways like, yeah, pretty
accurate.

SPEAKER_04 (56:48):
He may be a good person for the rejected.
He's looking at even creating asecondary board for the uh with
the BACB or in competition withthe competition for lack of a
better term, with the BACB,might be somebody that would be
an interesting person to talkto.
Also, you mentioned that youhave people like practitioners
in the field come and and givediscussions and things like that

(57:09):
from people in the field.
If there's anything we can do,so I kind of alluded to this
earlier, but shortly after theconference that we moderated,
Mike and I, honestly, mainlywith inspiration of people like
Maggie and yourself created ourown company.
So we've been doing our ownthing for about a year, doing a
lot of, I think, very innovativestuff.
We have fault insurancecompanies on some things, and

(57:31):
one doing a lot of ascent-based,compassionate-based care and
therapy and really focusing onquality over quantity.
So if there's anything we can door speak to a webinar, anything
for the do better collective,we'd love to do it because you
are a huge inspiration for usgoing on and doing our own
thing.
So thank you.

SPEAKER_01 (57:46):
Thank you so much.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (57:48):
Where do people find, besides in the uh the show
notes, but other than that,where would people find the do
better collective?

SPEAKER_00 (57:55):
Um, we have our website, dobettercollective.com.
We have Instagram, TikTok,Facebook, LinkedIn.
All just do better collective ifyou look it up.
I don't really do a whole lotwith TikTok.
I've been trying, but I'm justnot I'm not young enough to
figure it out.

SPEAKER_04 (58:09):
You don't have a do better dance or anything?
Come on, Megan.
You gotta learn that on thecruise.

SPEAKER_00 (58:19):
I do like a partnership with this company,
Step Forward AVA, and they had abunch of their younger staff
there that are still RBTs orjust newly certified DCBAs, and
they were, you know, making allthese TikTok videos.
And I shared my idea because Idon't know if you all have seen
the trend, but it's like youseem happier now.
And then the person's like,thanks.
I left an abusive relationshipand took care of myself or

(58:41):
something like that.
That's the trend.
And I was like, You guys shoulddo one where it's like you seem
happier now.
And then the person's like,Yeah, I left a crappy AVA
company and now I'm with StephFord.
And all other little youngpeople looked at me like I was
crazy.

SPEAKER_02 (58:54):
Like, we might still be talking about we'll we'll
we'll take that.
We'll and we'll credit you.
It's okay.

SPEAKER_00 (59:01):
So I'm like, all right, I really need to like
contract a 22-year-old to dosome stuff with that.

SPEAKER_02 (59:07):
We we've been trying with the podcast.
I'm with you.
I'm just not interested in thesocial media part, but it's
still relevant.
It and it it makes a differenceand it certainly lets us get a
little further reach.
So we agree.
We're and we're gonna have tosteal your idea just blatantly.

unknown (59:22):
Go for it.

SPEAKER_02 (59:23):
We we joked it, but we could probably go three, four
hours.
We are at the end of our time.
Thank you so, so much forbreaking us with all the
information.
And it's been a very, very funconversation.
I get the feeling we'll have youback at some point.
I like to do a little uh threeto four point synopsis here at
the end so we can do ourtagline.
So the first one I'm gonna say,Dan, is consider motivation over

(59:46):
control.

SPEAKER_04 (59:46):
Oh, I like that.
Oh maybe uh research.
What was it?
Research to practice to researchto practice to research, um not
just research to practice.

SPEAKER_02 (59:56):
Definitely do better and always analyze responsibly.
Cheers, Dr.
Megan.
Thank you so much for having me.
Thanks so much for your time.

SPEAKER_00 (01:00:02):
Thanks, guys.
Always analyze responsibly.

SPEAKER_02 (01:00:07):
ABA on tap is recorded live and unfiltered.
We're done for today.
You don't have to go home, butyou can't stay here.
See you next time.

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