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Central SIG Presents:  November Journal Club

Facilitator: Jessica Coleman, LPC, BCBA, LBA

Bio: Jessica is a licensed professional counselor and board certified behavior analyst with over a decade of experience across clinical practice, supervision, and interdisciplinary care. She is the owner and clinical director of Creekside Therapeutics, where she provides neurodiversity-affirming therapy, behavior analytic services, and professional training. Jessica’s work emphasizes ethical decision-making, scope-aware collaboration, and translating behavior analysis into compassionate, real-world practice across clinical and community settings.

Description: Blurred Lines: Ethical Implications of Social Media for Behavior Analysts explores how social media creates unique ethical risks for behavior analysts, including unintended dual relationships, informal treatment recommendations, and confidentiality breaches. The article reviews relevant ethical standards and offers practical guidance such as disguising client details, avoiding treatment advice without assessment, referring peers back to the literature, and incorporating organizational social media training. While published prior to the 2022 Ethics Code, it provides a conceptual foundation that complements more recent data-based research on how these ethical challenges show up in real online behavior.

Article can be found here. Article

Objectives:

At the conclusion of this journal club, participants will be able to:

1. Identify common ways behavior analysts’ social media engagement aligns and misaligns with the 2022 Ethics Code, with specific attention to confidentiality, scope of competence, and public statements.
2. Analyze real-world examples of online professional behavior and determine potential ethical risks using the BACB Ethics Code as a decision-making framework.
3. Describe proactive strategies for ethical social media use, including prevention, redirection, and organizational training approaches that reduce risk while preserving professional support and connection.

1 Learning CEU will be offered for this event. You must pre-register and stay for the entire event to earn a CEU. Free CEUs are available to all active VABA members. Students welcome and encouraged!

Interested in joining the Central SIG? Contact Emily Fleming at emilyarnold88@gmail.com