Ethics Dialogue: Spelling to Communicate – Reply by Abraham Graber

Quigley and colleagues (2024, Behavior Analysis in Practice, https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-024-01001-4) described a treatment recommendation scenario within a multi-disciplinary team setting for an adult with a developmental disability. The authors presented the information in a standard format to share how the involved parties identified, evaluated, and responded to the recommendation based upon their understanding of ethical decision-making. This commentary highlights a number of important strengths that played a key  role in the successful resolution of the challenge discussed by Quigley and colleagues. It further highlights some of the reasons clients may be drawn to non-evidence-based interventions and cautions behavior analysts to approach such situations with care. Though behavior analysts should not themselves provide non-evidence-based interventions, inordinate pressure on clients to avoid such interventions may constitute a form of coercion and may undermine clients’ trust in behavior analysts.