How has the UK Society revised the Ethical Code surrounding Behaviour Analysis?
Two significant revisions to the UK-SBA's ethical guidance, and what they mean for practitioners, families, and the future of behaviour analysis in the UK.
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Georgiana Koyama, BCBA
Founder, All Behaviour Consultancy
June 2026
📖 5 min read
The UK Society for Behaviour Analysis has updated its ethical guidance for practitioners, and for those of us working in behaviour analysis in the UK, the revisions feel genuinely significant. Not because they overturn anything fundamental, but because they reflect a profession that is maturing, developing its own identity, and beginning to trust its practitioners more fully.
Two specific changes stand out. Both relate to areas where the previous wording, well intentioned as it was, could unintentionally constrain the very practice it sought to protect.
First: Some Context on Why This Matters
Behaviour analysis in the UK has historically operated in close alignment with the Behavior Analyst Certification Board, the BACB, which is the primary international certification body for the profession. That alignment has brought rigour, standardisation, and credibility. It has also, at times, created a profession that felt as though it was operating with a framework designed primarily for a different healthcare and educational context.
The UK-SBA's ongoing work to establish guidance that reflects the specific realities of UK practice is important. The updated ethics code is part of that work.
Sometimes, in our effort to protect people, we create rules that unintentionally limit professional judgement and the public's understanding of what good behaviour analytic practice actually looks like.
Georgiana Koyama, BCBA, Founder of All Behaviour Consultancy.
That tension is real and worth naming. Ethical codes exist to protect clients, supervisees, and the integrity of the profession. But overly prescriptive codes can also produce practitioners who are more focused on compliance than on genuinely good practice. The two are not always the same thing.
Change One: Rethinking What Counts as Data
Data, evidence, and the limits of the line graph
Data remains at the centre of behaviour analytic practice. What has changed is the assumption embedded in the previous wording: that meaningful analysis must always be communicated through graphical displays. The updated guidance creates space for a broader understanding of what constitutes meaningful evidence of change.
This change matters more than it might initially appear.
In practice, some of the most meaningful progress I have witnessed in my work with children and families has come through forms of evidence that do not reduce neatly to a data point on a graph. A parent who, for the first time, feels genuinely equipped to understand their child's behaviour. A teaching assistant who no longer dreads Monday mornings. A child who walks into school without shutting down at the door.
These are real changes. They are observable, meaningful, and directly connected to the work of behaviour analysis. And yet I have seen them questioned, minimised, or dismissed in professional settings because they could not be plotted on a line graph with the right format and the right axes.
The distinction that matters
There is an important difference between being data-driven and being graph-driven. A data-driven practitioner gathers evidence systematically, analyses it rigorously, and allows it to inform decision making. A graph-driven practitioner produces the right visual outputs, regardless of whether those outputs capture the most meaningful aspects of what is changing. The updated guidance supports the former without mandating only the latter.
This does not mean graphical data analysis is being deprioritised. It remains a core tool, and rightly so. What it means is that pupil voice, parent voice, staff confidence, observational notes, and qualitative evidence of progress are now more explicitly recognised as legitimate forms of professional evidence alongside quantitative data displays.
That is a more honest reflection of what good practice actually looks like.
Change Two: Letting Families Tell Their Own
Testimonials, consent, and the visibility of impact
Previously, behaviour analysts were prohibited from sharing identifying information about clients or supervisees on social media or in public contexts. The revised code now creates space for this, where appropriate written consent has been obtained and GDPR requirements are met. This is a meaningful shift toward recognising that families, schools, and supervisees often want their progress to be seen.
I have never been fully convinced that making the impact of our work less visible was the most ethical response available to us.
Families who have spent months or years navigating systems that did not understand their child, who have finally found an approach that works, often want to talk about that. Supervisees who have grown significantly in their clinical confidence often want to acknowledge that publicly. Young people who have developed skills they did not have before sometimes want the world to know.
The previous guidance, in its effort to protect clients from unwanted exposure, created a framework in which the positive, transformative work of behaviour analysis was largely invisible to the public. That invisibility has real costs. It makes it harder for families who need support to find practitioners who can help. It makes it harder to challenge the persistent and damaging misconceptions about what modern, compassionate behaviour analysis actually involves.
What this change makes possible
Impact kept entirely private
Families can choose to share their stories, with proper consent and GDPR compliance in place.
Practitioners unable to reference client outcomes publicly
With written consent, real outcomes can be shared to help other families make informed decisions
Supervisees' professional growth largely invisible
Supervisees can publicly acknowledge development and growth where they wish to do so
Public understanding of ABA shaped by misinformation
Real stories from real families begin to form part of the public picture of what ethical ABA looks like.
The safeguards remain entirely appropriate. Written consent. GDPR compliance. Professional judgement about what is appropriate to share and when. The revised guidance does not remove those protections. It adds a framework within which authentic voices can be heard without violating them.
A Profession That Trusts Its Practitioners
What strikes me most about both of these changes is what they signal about the direction of the profession in the UK. They represent a move toward trusting practitioners to exercise genuine professional judgement, rather than requiring compliance with rules so prescriptive that judgement becomes unnecessary.
That trust has to be earned. It has to be held carefully. And it has to be accompanied by strong supervision, ongoing professional development, and a genuine commitment to the values that underpin ethical practice. None of that changes.
The most ethical practitioners are not those who follow rules most rigidly. They are those who understand the principles behind the rules clearly enough to navigate the situations the rules did not anticipate.
Georgiana Koyama, BCBA
The UK-SBA's updated guidance moves the profession closer to that kind of practice. It is a welcome development, and one that reflects the growing maturity and confidence of behaviour analysis as a discipline in the UK context.
For practitioners, families, and anyone with an interest in what good behaviour analytic practice looks like, these changes are worth understanding. They are not simply administrative updates. They are a signal about the kind of profession behaviour analysis in the UK is choosing to become.
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