Course Title: Professional Ethics 106
Instructor: James O'Heare, CABC, CDBC, PABC
Course Description:
This course will explore all of the major areas in the field of professional ethics and professional practice guidelines / code of ethics. In particular, this course will explore normative ethical guidelines and the principles underlying them. The student will explore issues related to competence, confidentiality, informed consent, honesty in marketing and also the ethics of implementing aversive methods, emphasizing avoiding them of course.
Learning Objectives:
Upon completing this course, the student will be able to:
- Work through a formal ethical decision making process
- Explain why confidentiality is important
- Define informed consent and explain how to achieve it and why it is important
- Define professionalism and explain why it is important
- Explain what professional practice guidelines or codes of ethics are and how they can help the professional
- Define and discuss competency and explain why it is important
- Discuss responsible advertising practices and why they are important
- Explain how to decide when aversive stimulation may be necessary and work through the LIEBI model
- Discuss ethics of assessment processes
Texts:
- A Guide to the Association of Animal Behavior Professionals’ Professional Practice Guidelines by James O’Heare. http://www.associationofanimalbehaviorprofessionals.com/guidelines.html
- O’Heare, J. (2009), The least intrusive effective behavior intervention (LIEBI) algorithm and levels of intrusiveness table: A proposed best practices model. Journal of Applied Companion Animal Behavior. 3, 7-25. http://www.associationofanimalbehaviorprofessionals.com/liebi.pdf
- Bailey, J. S., & Burch, M. R. (2005). Ethics for Behavior Analysts: A Practical Guide to the Behavior Analyst Certification board Guidelines for Responsible Conduct: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. (recommended but not required)
- Course Notes
Course Evaluation:
This course will be evaluated by short essay assignments that will reflect and demonstrate mastery of the course topics and achievement of the learning objectives. The final grade will be the mean average of the assignment grades.
Prerequisites: None
CEUs: Continuing Education Credits Available. See Course Approvals page for credits.