Soo is cruelty the point?
Seems like they are giving people anti violence drugs that are not violent. Seems like big pharma made a deal or this test to make a society like "We Happy Few".
That's terrible, but so are the treatments this article is suggesting. ABA is abuse.
Behaviorism, in general, has lots of research supporting its efficacy in changing behavior, but completely ignores the mental health effects of the trauma from the behaviorist interventions.
This might be made more clear with a thought experiment from Dr Becky Kennedy's mostly-unrelated parenting book, The Good Inside. (Great book, btw. Highly recommended for all parents.) I know a 100% effective treatment for any childhood behavior: when the child engages in the behaviour, lock them outside in a cage overnight. It will take at most 3 treatments and they'll never exhibit that behavior again, guaranteed!
Aside from the hypothetical example obviously not passing ethics review, that's literally how behaviorism research is conducted: the only thing they measure is efficacy in altering behaviour. That's a really low bar.
ABA is "effective" because children are being conditioned to avoid being abused.
I've been offered behavioral therapy as an adult, but now I see that fortunately the psychiatrist in charge was dismissed before it would start. Later I learned that he wrote down I "don't meet minimums"... and now I think I know what he meant: there was a session where I'm pretty sure he was trying me out, buy didn't manage to provoke me. F-ing thank the FSM.
The only time I've done something remotely similar, was with a stray cat that wouldn't stop attacking everyone: put her in a dark bathroom (with food, water, and a litter box), turning the light only every few hours to offer her to come out to me. Took the stubborn thing 3 days to make up her mind... and from then on she became a fluffy ball with just the occasional minor outburst. I still admit that was basically torture... except the alternative was to either throw her out back onto the street, or give to a shelter with a 24-hour "no adoption, no cat" policy.
It's hard to believe anyone would advocate doing something like that to a person.
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