What is ABA???
Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is a science and one of the branches of behavior analysis which uses observable and measurable interaction of a person or other organism with the environment to understand behavior. Behavior analysts focus strongly on what happens outside that makes an influence on behavior instead of seeking the cause from the inside of the organisms. ABA bring those principles from behavior analysis into the applied settings to understand daily behaviors and emphasize any social problems.
For example, a parent claimed that her child screamed quite often because he has autism. She used "autism" as the reason for the child's behavior but "autism" is just a label and does not give you an explanation of why the child screamed. After an applied behavior analyst does an evaluation, he found out that the child only screamed whenever the mother has not paid attention to him for a long time. Therefore, screaming is a seeking-attention behavior. The child learned that everytime he screams, his mother will turn around and give attention to him immediately.
ABA has been used in different fields such as: education (e.g., Craft, Alber & Heward, 1998), business (e.g., Marholin & Gray, 1976), sustainability (e.g., Wu & Miller, 2012), recreation (e.g., Pierce & Risley, 1974), etc. Most of all, ABA has been used popularly for autism intervention (e.g., Slocom, Miller & Tiger, 2012).