Readings

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 1

Social Significance and the Centrality of Human Beings: A Response to “Editor’s Note:

Societal changes and expression of concern about Rekers and Lovaas’ (1974) Behavioral

Treatment of Deviant Sex-Role Behaviors in a Male Child”

Austin H. Johnson

University of California, Riverside

Author Note

Austin H. Johnson. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6349-0049

I thank Dr. Rose Jaffery, Jeff Newman, and Dr. Melissa Collier-Meek for their feedback

and suggestions. I thank Maris Ehlers, Kirk Murphy’s sister, for her willingness to talk about

Kirk with me. I thank Jim Burroway for his in-depth reporting on Kirk’s life.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Austin H. Johnson,

Graduate School of Education, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521, United

States. Email: [email protected]

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 2

Abstract

In 1974, Rekers and Lovaas published an article in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis

(JABA) entitled “Behavioral Treatment of Deviant Sex-Role Behaviors in a Male Child,”

wherein the authors coached a gender-non-conforming child’s parents to ignore and physically

abuse that child when he engaged in gender-non-conforming behaviors. In October 2020, the

Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (SEAB) and JABA’s editor-in-chief Dr.

Linda LeBlanc published a Statement of Concern regarding Rekers and Lovaas (1974), which

described some concerns regarding the paper and then provided justification for the journal’s

decision to not retract this paper. In this current response, I describe criticisms of JABA’s

rationale for not retracting this paper. I note that the criteria used to determine retraction by

SEAB and LeBlanc (2020) were not applied in the manner suggested by official retraction

guidelines. I describe contemporaneous criticisms of the Rekers and Lovaas (1974) paper (i.e.,

Winkler ,1977; Nordyke et al., 1977) which were written by a set of authors that included

Donald Baer, one of the foundational figures in applied behavior analysis (ABA). I describe the

active discussion within the psychological sciences at the time of publication to depathologize

homosexuality. I criticize the 2020 Statement of Concern’s focus on damage to the field of ABA

as opposed to the harm done to Kirk, and question errors of commission and omission made by

SEAB and LeBlanc in the 2020 Statement of Concern. I end with an argument that Rekers and

Lovaas (1974) should be retracted from JABA.

Keywords: behaviorism, applied behavior analysis, LGBTQ, gender identity, retraction,

ethics

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 3

Response to “Editor’s Note: Societal changes and expression of concern about Rekers and

Lovaas’ (1974) Behavioral Treatment of Deviant Sex-Role Behaviors in a Male Child”

History is replete with examples of unethical conduct and abuse conducted in the name of

science. In the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, the United States Public Health Service observed the

course of syphilis infections in 400 African-American men, did not inform them of their

diagnoses, and deliberately withheld treatment from these men for over 25 years (Paul &

Brookes, 2015). Starting in 1955 and 1956, children with intellectual disability were deliberately

infected with hepatitis at the Willowbrook State School in a stated effort to “conduct well-

designed studies to shed new light on the natural history and prevention of the disease” and the

development of a vaccine (Krugman, 1986, p. 159). Beginning in 1990, researchers from

Arizona State University collected blood samples from members of the Havasupai (or Havasu

Baaja) Tribe under the pretense of conducting diabetes research; after being explicitly told by

members of the Tribe that they would not support other uses of their samples for purposes

including schizophrenia research, and without any such language being included in consent

documentation, Dr. Therese Markow utilized these blood samples for research into schizophrenia

and inbreeding (Drabiak-Syed, 2010). The list goes on.

In each of the cases above, broader public awareness of the experimentation that was

being conducted resulted in significant criticism and reflection on the part of the scientific

community and the larger public. One possible material outcome for a paper that engages in

ethical violations such as these is retraction from its publishing journal. Retraction involves an

official statement from a journal which communicates that the published paper contains “such

seriously flawed or erroneous content or data that their findings and conclusions cannot be relied

upon,” for reasons which may include fabrication, plagiarism, or unethical conduct (COPE

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 4

Council, 2019, p. 4). The Council of Science Editors (CSE) refers more broadly to “scientific

misconduct,” which the CSE defines as “any action that involves mistreatment of research

subjects or purposeful manipulation of the scientific record such that it no longer reflects

observed truth,” as one possible reason for retraction (CSE Editorial Policy Committee, 2018, p.

47). The Retraction Watch Database, which is the most comprehensive database of papers with

retractions, statements of concern, or corrections, lists 320 research articles which have been

retracted due to ethical violations by their author or authors as of November 11, 2020.

The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) notes that only in rare instances of

retraction should the original paper be removed completely from the journal’s online presence;

however, retraction should always involve an official statement from the journal in print and

online formats that the paper has been retracted. This statement should be associated with the

online paper itself, and journals should work to ensure that notice of retraction is communicated

across bibliographic databases and other online searches (COPE Council, 2019). If a journal does

not feel that a retraction is justified or warranted, or if a final decision regarding retraction is

pending based upon the findings of a formal investigation, then a journal may instead issue an

Expression of Concern (or Statement of Concern), which “is a publication notice that is generally

made by an editor to draw attention to possible problems, but it does not go so far as to retract or

correct an article” (CSE Editorial Policy Committee, 2018, p. 70).

Rekers and Lovaas (1974)

In October 2020, the Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (SEAB) and the

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA)’s editor-in-chief Dr. Linda LeBlanc published a

Statement of Concern regarding an article by Rekers and Lovaas (1974) entitled “Behavioral

Treatment of Deviant Sex-Role Behaviors in a Male Child” in response to concerns brought to

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 5

the SEAB and JABA regarding the ethicality of the conduct described in the 1974 paper. A

sequentially-ordered list of events leading up to this decision is illustrated in Figure 1.

Rekers and Lovaas (1974) begin their article by enumerating the ways in which their

client, a four-year old child identified as “Kraig”, engages in a number of “feminine” behaviors.

In describing this child, whose real name was Kirk Andrew Murphy1, the authors emphasize the

extreme perceived pathology of Kirk’s behavior, noting that he “appeared to be very skilled at

manipulating [his mother] to satisfy his feminine interests” (p. 174). The authors justify Kirk’s

pathologization with four points: (a) feminine behavior by people who are identified by others as

male is associated with “social isolation and ridicule”, (b) such behavior is also associated with

depression, suicidality, imprisonment, and joblessness, (c) “intervention on deviant sex-role

development in childhood may be the only effective manner of treating [i.e., preventing] serious

forms of sexual deviance in adulthood,” and (d) these behaviors disturbed Kirk’s parents (p.

175). Notably, based on the information provided in Rekers (1972), Rekers and Lovaas (1974),

and Burroway (2011), Kirk himself did not express any issue with his own behavior or express

an interest in change.

Initial observations were taken by Rekers and Lovaas (1974) of the extent to which Kirk

engaged with toys associated with masculine or feminine traits in a lab and home setting, and

then “treatment” began with the researcher prompting an adult accompanying Kirk in a clinic

setting to pay attention to and praise Kirk when he played with masculine-associated toys, and

ignore Kirk when he played with feminine-associated toys. When Kirk would tantrum in

response to his mother ignoring him, the authors reassured her that “she was doing the right thing

and was doing it well” (p. 179). At home, Kirk’s mother was first instructed to reinforce Kirk

1 Based on conversations with Kirk’s sister, Maris, Kirk preferred male pronouns and identified as a cisgender man; thus, I use male pronouns to refer to Kirk (M. Ehlers, personal communication, November 11, 2020).

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 6

with a blue token when he engaged in “nongender behaviors” that were “helpful” and “desired”

like washing his hands, and then to punish Kirk with a red token when he engaged in either

“tantrums and disobedient behaviors” (in the first stage of the study) or non-gender-conforming

behaviors (in the second stage; p. 180). These red tokens could result in any of three outcomes

for Kirk: (a) losing a point in the token economy earned with a blue token, (b) going into time-

out, and (c) being spanked by his father. In Rekers’ (1972) dissertation, upon which Rekers and

Lovaas (1974) is based, Rekers notes that at least one prior beating from Kirk’s father for his

feminine behavior had been severe. Kirk’s brother Mark and sister Maris remember this period

of their lives as exceptionally difficult, with journalist Jim Burroway writing that:

Mark today regards the chips as an extremely painful chapter in his life. When I first

asked him to describe how they were used, he broke down and sobbed for several

minutes, and it took him a long time before he could compose himself. When he finally

gathered himself up again, he still couldn’t approach this topic directly… Mark took a

deep breath and explained, “My goal was to take the beating for my brother.” Mark had

long been accustomed to getting into trouble and being punished for it, and so he

reasoned that he could take the beatings more easily than his younger brother. “I saw my

brother’s whole back side bruised so badly one time, my dad should have gone to jail for

it. Of course, he was somewhat carrying out instructions from the therapist. But my dad

whipped my bare ass so many times before that, I figured I could take it. I mean that’s the

way we got spanked. You dropped your pants, you bent over the bed, and he whipped

your bottom with a belt.”… Maris doesn’t really remember the chips per se, but she does

remember the whippings. “After a belt evening, it was always very quiet,” she said.

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“We’d all be in our rooms, my Dad would drink and my mom would yell.” Maris

remembers sneaking into Kirk’s room at night just so they could hug each other… “I

remember Kirk having a complete meltdown because of the poker chips,” she [Kirk’s

cousin Donna] said. “One time he begged his mom to take the poker chips away. I knew

it was very traumatic for Kirk because he got spanked because of the chips.” (Burroway,

2011)

When describing the results of this project, Rekers and Lovaas (1974) note that they

largely observed the behavior changes that they sought, but that Kirk was not generalizing his

masculine behaviors to situations when he was alone; “this, of course, may suggest that he was

‘going underground’ with his deviance, suppressing femininity in the company of adults” (p.

183). They also describe the most “effective” form of punishment for Kirk:

The disobedient behaviors did [emphasis in original] sharply decrease, however, when

the red tokens were backed up by spanking. Kraig was told that he would get one “swat”

from his father for each red token he collected. After receiving two swats in this manner

for red tokens he has received while engaged in nongender-related behaviors, Kraig

carefully avoided receiving but a few red tokens from that time on, even though the

treatment was to persist for more than half a year. (p. 185)

In a section of the paper titled “Informal Clinical Observations,” the authors write that

“before therapy, Kraig was a ‘crybaby’,” but that after being punished for engaging in feminine

behaviors, “Kraig’s mother began to complain to us that her son had become a ‘rough-

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 8

neck’…we reassured the mother that such ‘mildly delinquent’ behavior was much easier to

correct in future years than feminine behaviors would be” (p. 186). In the discussion section of

the paper, the authors describe Kirk’s behavior before their “treatment” in the following way:

When we first saw him, the extent of his feminine identification was so profound (his

mannerisms, gestures, fantasies, flirtations, etc., as shown in his ‘swishing’ around the

home and clinic, fully dressed as a woman with long dress, wig, nail polish, high

screechy voice, slovenly seductive eyes [emphasis added]) that it suggests irreversible

neurological and biochemical determinants. (p. 187)2

Upon initial referral to Rekers and Lovaas, Kirk would still have been only four years old

(Rekers & Lovaas, 1974; Burroway, 2011). Rekers and Lovaas repeatedly imply that Kirk is not

the first non-gender-conforming child that they have “treated,” noting that “three observers were

already trained in a pilot investigation…that used identical procedures and materials” (1974, p.

177), and that “we have similar boys in treatment with similar therapy outcomes” whose results

are likely to generalize “particularly if these children are quite young (less than 7 yr of age)” (p.

188). This information is confirmed in Rekers’ dissertation (1972), wherein Rekers describes

“treatment” for five children between 5 and 8 years old who were “the youngest among eight

patients available for this research” (p. 54)3. The authors note in the article that they cannot

conclude whether “we have produced changes in future preference for sex mates,” but that

follow-up data from adolescence and young adulthood “will allow us to claim a preventative

2 In an interview, Kirk’s mother strongly disputed this specific description of Kirk, stating about Rekers: “I can’t believe he made up all that crap!... Oh, that makes me so angry. What a creep!” (Burroway, 2011). 3 Kirk is also described in Rekers’ 1972 dissertation, but he is referred to as 5 years old, not 4 years old, likely because he was 4 years 11 months (i.e., nearly 5 years old) at the time of referral to Rekers and Lovaas.

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 9

treatment for extreme adult deviations of transvestism, transsexualism, or some forms of

homosexuality” (p. 188). In the final sentence of their manuscript, the researchers look with

excitement to the future of such “treatments”: “one can entertain some optimism about

behavioral treatment of gender role problems, but until more cases are reported, one can only

entertain the most tentative hopes that such an effective treatment has been isolated” (p. 188).

It is difficult to write in a scientific tone in the face of cruelty such as this. And it is

difficult to say anything more disturbing than the truth of this paper: Rekers and Lovaas (1974)

engaged in and facilitated the shaming and abuse of a four-year-old child who engaged in

gender-non-conforming behavior. The language used to describe four-year-old Kirk Murphy, the

use of the phrase “slovenly seductive eyes,” is truly and deeply disturbing. The actions taken

against this child are shameful and as a parent, a BCBA, and a human being, they hurt my heart.

Rekers and Lovaas (1974) constitutes the ongoing abuse and sexualization of a four-year-old.

Those actions were and these words are abuse.

Contemporaneous Response from Winkler (1977) and Nordyke et al. (1977)

In the year immediately following the publication of Rekers and Lovaas (1974), two

manuscripts were submitted to JABA expressing concern about the ethics of Rekers and Lovaas

(1974), with ultimate publication of these two critical articles in a 1977 issue of the journal (i.e.,

Winkler, 1977; Nordyke, Baer, Etzel, & LeBlanc, 1977). The set of five authors across these two

articles, one of whom is recognized as one of the most foundational figures in applied behavior

analysis (i.e., Donald Baer), provided emphatic criticisms of the paper as a whole, and in the case

of Nordyke et al. (1977), a point-by-point response to the four rationale used to justify this

“treatment”. In his response to the Rekers and Lovaas paper, Winkler (1977) writes that “where

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 10

‘pathology’ is associated with sexual deviance, much of it, if not all, can be regarded as a

function of social attitudes to sexual behavior” (p. 550).

Rekers was provided with the opportunity to respond to these criticisms with a rejoinder,

which was published in the same issue of JABA in 1977 as the two criticisms. Throughout the

rejoinder, Rekers makes it clear that his personal convictions, religious convictions, and his

disgust with people who are LGBTQ was a driving force behind his research. Rekers writes:

If values regarding desirability of certain sex-role behavior patterns are empirically based

(as Winkler proposed), would we not prefer heterosexual behavior as opposed to

homosexual behavior, since Kinsey, Pomeroy, and Martin (1948) reported that a

significantly larger percentage of men prefer women as sex mates than men as sex mates?

Should parents withhold intervention for a child’s cheating behavior if an empirical study

discovered 51% of the adult population is dishonest and suffers no resultant unhappiness?

Obviously, it is an epistemological error to base value decisions on empirical data alone.

For example, parents may reject dishonesty or homosexual behaviors as wrong on moral

grounds, regardless of what percentage of the population happily engages in those

behaviors (1977, p. 560).

Rekers goes on to state that the responding articles provided no evidence that “most

parents, if given a choice, would consider it desirable to foster homosexuality, transsexualism, or

transvestism in their child” (1977, p. 560). He argues that alleviating the social rejection

experienced by non-gender-conforming children by changing Kirk’s behavior is appropriate, and

that “this goal alone would have justified intervention” (p. 561). Rekers goes even farther in

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emphasizing the importance of a family’s wishes in justifying intervention when he states that “a

parent could legitimately request the prevention of homosexual behavior, for example, on the

basis that it is morally wrong, even if it were possible for the child to develop as a contented

homosexual” (p. 563). The following section is particularly critical to an understanding of the

full set of criteria applied by Rekers and Lovaas in determining the justification for “treatment”:

When the boy’s parents came to us for help in 1970, they requested treatment for Kraig

because of his current unhappiness, and they strongly desired professional intervention to

prevent an outcome of transsexualism, transvestism, or homosexuality, which they feared

[emphasis added]. While there was no logical reason to refuse cooperation with the

parents, there was every possible reason to intervene: … (6) The goals of the parents

were consistent with the broader social codes and the moral expectations of the

community in which they resided. (7) The intervention goals were consistent with the

Christian ethical value system (see Evans, 1975) held in common by the parents and the

therapist, Rekers [emphasis added]. (pp. 563-564)

In response to Winkler’s (1977) assertion that the professionally and morally correct

thing to do would be to support Kirk’s identity, Rekers writes that “we find this line of argument

to be ethically unacceptable (Evans, 1975) and professionally irresponsible” (1977, pp. 565-566),

reinforcing his assertion with the notion that “there are specific behaviors that are inappropriate

for males in all circumstances…it is an important socialization process for the boy [emphasis in

original] to learn that he will not grow up with the biological possibility of having sexual

intercourse with a man” (p. 566). These comments go on. I have quoted them at length, and I

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 12

would direct the reader to the original rejoinder for a complete description of Rekers’ hate.

Suffice it to say, Rekers is continuously and emphatically assertive in his belief that “this kind of

debilitating sex-role inflexibility” is unethical, immoral, and must be changed (p. 566); quite

simply, “nurturant behavior in a boy is desirable, but when that behavior is accompanied by

verbalizations of a female identity, it is undesirable” (p. 567).

Furthermore, Rekers continuously asserts that the parents’ interests in this case are more

important than those of Kirk, in fact asserting that “by itself, the child’s lack of choice in an

intervention does not pose any legal or ethical problem” (p. 564). In a direct statement regarding

the practice of gender conversion therapy, he writes that “improved general social adjustment

and peer relationships have been reported for gender-disturbed boys who have made such a

transition with intervention” (p. 567), ending his paper with the assertion that this was “an

intervention that was ethically and psychologically appropriate” (p. 569).

For their part, Nordyke and colleagues (1977) close their response to Rekers and Lovaas’

original 1977 article with the following statement: “we question the methods that appear to be

the result of the researchers’ own sex-role stereotyping. Only time and monitoring will tell the

outcomes” (p. 557).

Kirk Murphy committed suicide in 2003.

Societal Change and an Expression of Concern

On October 20, 2020, the Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (SEAB) and

Dr. Linda LeBlanc, Editor-in-Chief of JABA, published their Statement of Concern regarding

Rekers and Lovaas (1974). The statement begins by acknowledging that early issues of JABA

had included articles “that seem controversial in retrospect” (SEAB & LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1830).

Providing examples of terms like the r-word, “deviant”, and “mentally handicapped”, the authors

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 13

accurately note that terminology has changed over the last decades, just as the use of punishment

procedures has changed (p. 1830).

A number of topics from this Statement of Concern need to be addressed. I begin with the

primary decision within this statement: that no retraction would take place. I discuss the broader

language used within the Statement of Concern, alongside transcribed interviews with Drs. Linda

LeBlanc and Henry Roane, and connect these with the fundamental inadequacy of this Statement

of Concern and the active violence it commits upon people who identify as LGBTQ.

Rationale for Decision to Not Retract

The authors of the 2020 Statement of Concern directly identify its genesis as concerns

brought to the SEAB and JABA by members of the ABA community, and note that SEAB and

JABA have been presented with the decision of what action (e.g., retraction) to take regarding

Rekers and Lovaas (1974). The authors of the Statement of Concern go on to write that a

decision of retraction should be based on one of three major violations according to the

Retraction Guidelines provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE Council, 2019).

The statement’s authors note that one such violation is a “clear ethics violation” (SEAB &

LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1832). They then state the following:

By today’s standards and in light of our current scientific knowledge, the study would be

considered unethical and would not be published in JABA. However, the available

evidence does not make it clear that the original study was unethical by the standards of

that day [emphasis added]. While the evidential criteria were not met for retraction,

SEAB and the Editor of JABA made the decision to issue an official Expression of

Concern (COPE, 2019) along with this editorial to clearly outline the concerns about the

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 14

Rekers and Lovaas (1974) paper and the various harms potentially or actually resulting

from it. (pp. 1832-1833)

This conclusion does not meet a logical or professional standard of defensibility for three

main reasons: (a) the inaccurate application of retraction guidelines by the 2020 Statement of

Concern’s authors, (b) abundant evidence of contemporaneous ethical concerns regarding this

study and the pathologization of homosexuality and gender non-conformity, and (c) Rekers’

continued insistence that a child’s preferences are not relevant to treatment, which is in direct

opposition to ethical standards in ABA as articulated in the 1960s, 1970s, and today.

1. Inaccurate Application of Retraction Guidelines. Modern retraction guidelines,

including the COPE guidelines specifically cited within the 2020 Statement of Concern, do not

require that the ethical violation occurred at the time of publication. Instead, “editors should

consider retracting a publication if…it reports unethical research” (COPE Council, 2019). No

time period or statute of limitations is linked to the ethical nature of the research by COPE or

CSE; instead, this standard of “unethical by the standards of the day” has been imposed by the

statement’s authors, not by COPE (SEAB & LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1833). Although the CSE notes

that, when considering retraction, one question that may need to be answered by a journal’s

editors is “does it matter if today’s standards are different or more strictly enforced?,” the CSE

does not provide specific guidance on this issue (2018, p. 71). The organization instead poses

this as one question that a journal may consider when evaluating a paper for retraction. If the

editorial staff of JABA assert that their answer to this question is “yes, it does matter,” then the

justification for that decision should be articulated and the adoption of this criterion should be

explicitly stated.

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2. Abundant Evidence of Contemporaneous Ethical Concerns. The 2020 Statement of

Concern’s authors repeatedly describe the contemporaneous criticisms by Winkler (1977) and

Nordyke et al. (1977) of Rekers and Lovaas’ abuse in 1974 in their very own statement. Winkler

(1977) and Nordyke et al. (1977) clearly state that this published documentation of abuse did not

conform to their ethical standards. Indeed, when first introducing the Rekers and Lovaas (1974)

paper, the authors of the 2020 Statement of Concern write that this is “one clear instance in

which an early JABA study was considered controversial, and potentially unethical even at the

time of publication [emphasis added]” (2020, p. 1830). The only arguments presented by the

2020 Statement of Concern’s authors which would push against the assertion that this research

would have been contemporaneously considered unethical was that (a) the research was federally

funded, and (b) the American Psychiatric Association (APA), the Diagnostic and Statistical

Manual (DSM), and society at large still considered homosexuality to be pathological. The

statement’s authors also feel it important to note that the Belmont Report did not yet exist and

that modern Institutional Review Boards were not yet firmly established (p. 1832). This

juxtaposition of the responses by Nordyke and colleagues (1977) and Winkler (1977) alongside

documentation that the Rekers and Lovaas paper was federally funded by the National Institute

of Mental Health and that APA still “clearly felt that homosexuality was pathological” are

repeatedly presented in the 2020 Statement of Concern on pages 1831 and 1832.

This latter defense of the ethical conduct of Rekers and Lovaas (1974) is factually

inaccurate. As clearly stated by Drescher (2015), “in December 1973, APA’s Board of Trustees

(BOT) voted to remove homosexuality from the DSM” (p. 571). This decision was supported by

58% of 10,000 voting APA members when it was placed before them in response to concerns

raised by psychoanalysts about the removal. The years leading up to this decision were replete

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 16

with LGBTQ activism in the psychological sphere; in 1970, LGBTQ activists disrupted a paper

presentation at APA’s Annual Meeting by Nathaniel McConaghy “who was discussing the use of

aversive conditioning techniques in the treatment of sexual deviation” (Bayer, 1987, p. 103). As

described by Bayer, the paper presentation itself was consistently interrupted by activists

shouting “vicious” and “torture,” with the resulting disruption being so significant that some

psychiatrists demanded that APA refund their airline tickets. Subsequent panels were convened

to discuss “the stigma caused by the ‘homosexuality’ diagnosis” at both the 1971 and 1972

meetings of APA (Drescher, 2015, p. 570).

Notably, Rekers’ doctoral work at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA),

provided him with access to a number of individuals who were actively working on the very

issues described above, including Dr. Richard Green, who at that time was Director of the

Gender Identity Research and Treatment Program at UCLA’s School of Medicine. In his

dissertation, Rekers directly thanks Dr. Green and others “who referred child patients to us in the

UCLA Psychology Clinic” (1972, p. ix). The same year as Rekers’ dissertation defense, Dr.

Green published an article in the International Journal of Psychiatry which “subjected the

orthodox psychiatric perspective on homosexuality to a series of critical questions” (Bayer, 1987,

p. 112). Thus, Rekers was certainly in contact with individuals at UCLA who were engaged in

conversations surrounding the ethics of the pathologization of homosexuality and gender non-

conformity. Given all of this, it appears that the assertion by the 2020 Statement of Concern’s

authors that APA “clearly felt that homosexuality was pathological” at the time of publication is

not based in historical fact (SEAB & LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1831).

Rekers and Lovaas’ (1974) initial submission to JABA was on April 12, 1973, and final

acceptance after revision occurred on February 18, 1974. Three months prior to this final

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 17

acceptance, APA had removed homosexuality from the DSM. For at least two years before that,

APA had been actively discussing the pathologization of homosexuality in national venues.

Thus, even if Rekers and Lovaas themselves did not see any ethical problems with their

behavior, foundational members of the ABA community (i.e., Nordyke et al., 1977) as well as

much of the larger psychological community clearly did. When Dr. LeBlanc says during the

Behavioral Observations podcast interview that “this basically was a time when homosexuality

and gender-inconsistent behavior was considered part of our kind of infrastructure and taxonomy

of pathology,” Dr. LeBlanc is making a historically inaccurate statement (2020, 09:07).

3. Social Significance and Rekers’ Defense of Parental Wishes. In their foundational

article “Some Applied Dimensions of Applied Behavior Analysis,” Baer, Wolf, and Risley

(1968) write that “a primary question in the evaluation of applied research is: how immediately

important is this behavior or these stimuli to this subject?” (p. 93); Cooper, Heron, and Heward

further define the “applied” nature of ABA as signaling “ABA’s commitment to affecting

improvements in behaviors that enhance and improve people’s lives” by selecting “behaviors to

change that are socially significant for participants” (2007, p. 16). The “Professional and Ethical

Compliance Code for Behavior Analysts,” published by the Behavior Analyst Certification

Board (BACB), the largest certification board for practitioners of ABA in the world, has an

abundance of content elaborating upon and codifying the centrality of the individual to the

practice of ABA: put simply, “the rights of the client are paramount” (2014, p. 7).

Rekers clearly disagrees with the assertion, codified by Baer et al. in 1968 and enshrined

by the BACB in 2014, that the health and well-being of the client must be the primary focus of

work in ABA. As referenced earlier, Rekers was not apparently concerned with violating this

ethical principle, writing that “a parent could legitimately request the prevention of homosexual

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 18

behavior, for example, on the basis that it is morally wrong, even if it were possible for the child

to develop as a contented homosexual” (1977, p. 563), and that “by itself, the child’s lack of

choice in an intervention does not pose any legal or ethical problem” (p. 564). Rekers is blunt in

his assertion that he has no qualms with violating a central ethical principle of our field, and he

was clearly aware that this assertion was in opposition to the interpretation of ethical guidelines

by members of the behavior analytic and psychiatric communities. In the first sentence of their

response to Rekers and Lovaas (1974), Nordyke, Baer, Etzel, and LeBlanc (1977) write that “in

their recent article, Rekers and Lovaas (1974) appear to be not only accepting but also supporting

sex-role stereotyping, thereby failing to contribute to the solution of a larger social problem” (p.

553). They go on to write that “if therapists are to gain confidence in the ethics of their treatment,

they should guard against treatment that unsophisticatedly threatens diversity in society” (p.

554). Winkler adds that “it can be argued that Rekers and Lovaas, by using traditionally defined

sex roles, may be preparing children for less than optimal adult roles” (1977, p. 551). Put simply,

Rekers is emphatic and unapologetic in his unethical conduct, which both at that time and today,

is clearly stated to be at odds with the foundational principles of ABA.

Notably, and following a trend of the slow watering-down of LGBTQ pathologization by

APA, the diagnostic category of homosexuality was replaced by Sexual Orientation Disturbance

after the APA’s votes in 1972; this new category allowed for a diagnosis anchored in a client’s

homosexuality “if an individual with same-sex attractions found them distressing and wanted to

change” (Drescher, 2015, p. 571). Given that no evidence is provided in Rekers and Lovaas

(1974) that Kirk found his own feminine behavior to be distressing, and indeed the repeated

assertions by Rekers (1977) that a parent’s concerns supersede those of a child, a defense of this

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 19

rationale based on the presence of Sexual Orientation Disturbance would also appear to be

inappropriate.

In the weighing of this evidence, where both (a) the facts of this abuse, its conduct, and

its vociferous and bigoted defense are easily available, and (b) five ABA researchers including

one of the founders of the field provide forceful and impassioned arguments against this abuse,

are pitted against (c) the historically inaccurate assertion that, in 1974, homosexuality was still

pathologized within the DSM and APA as a whole, (d) the government’s blessing (cf., the

Tuskegee Syphilis Study), and (e) a general argument that society was different back then (cf.,

the title of the Statement of Concern), it is difficult to understand how the burden of unethical

conduct was not judged to have been met by the authors of the 2020 Statement of Concern.

Commissions and Omissions

Rekers’ Rejoinder. Reading the Statement of Concern and nothing else, one would have

no idea that Rekers himself responded to the Nordyke and colleagues (1977) and Winkler (1977)

articles in the very same issue of JABA as those critiques. Indeed, this response from Rekers

could be found on the pages immediately after the Nordyke and colleagues response in the paper

copy of the journal. This rejoinder document by Rekers (1977) is cited in the 2020 Statement of

Concern once, as a citation in support of the assertion by the Statement of Concern’s authors that

homosexuality was considered pathological by members of the broader scientific community:

Winkler (1977) pointed out that some researchers (Davison, 1976; Winett & Winkler,

1972) were already expressing concerns about the type of behavioral goals set in that

same decade, though others, including the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and

its framework for diagnosing mental disorders (APA, 1968), clearly felt that

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 20

homosexuality was pathological (Bieber, 1976; Rekers, 1977) [emphasis added]. (p.

1831).

Thus, readers who access the Rekers and Lovaas (1974) paper will also see the 2020

Statement of Concern that includes mention of contemporary criticism of that same paper. What

the reader will not see is that Rekers replied to these criticisms by stating that his religious

convictions and personal morality justified, in his mind, the psychological and physical abuse of

a non-gender-conforming four-year-old whose features were described in a sexualized,

prejudiced, hateful, and ultimately inhumane manner in the original 1974 paper.

In Further Defense of No Retraction. In their interview on the Behavioral Observations

podcast, Drs. Henry Roane and Linda LeBlanc expand upon their understanding of the criteria

for an article’s retraction:

Dr. Roane: (30:52)

Typically, you reserve a retraction for a study that's been published that you have a

reason to doubt the validity of the findings and that there are errors in the methodology or

in the conclusions. And so the retraction is a statement to say, "This study is wrong, not

in terms of its conclusions but in terms of its actual methods, that there was flawed

science going on." So, an example of this, is the Wakefield study on vaccines and autism.

And that's a study that has been retracted. When you look at this study, it was federally

funded, it was a study that may have been in accord with whatever human subjects

protections there were at the time. That's something that you have to go through for NIH

funding. But the statement of concern, or expression of concern as it's sometimes called,

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 21

really was the most appropriate route because as a board member for SEAB, what we're

trying to do with that organization is to promote the advancement of the science of the

experimental analysis of behavior. And when you have a paper on the docket that is being

used to harm people and to hurt people and to hurt our field, then I think we all felt very

strongly that that's something that we needed to discuss. And any time someone goes to

the article, there needs to be something from our editor and our board saying, "We have

an issue with this."

Dr. LeBlanc: (33:34)

Yeah. So, with a retraction, you're really in a position where you need to have legally

defensible evidence that data were falsified, that people were harmed, and the procedures

that were done were not what were being reported or described. And from 50 years ago,

we don't know exactly what they knew or didn't know, and we didn't have the same

human subjects protections and standard assent procedures. So, while we didn't have a lot

of paper trail that documented scientific misconduct at the time, we definitely know the

paper has been used inappropriately and we can stop that.

The statements made by Drs. LeBlanc and Roane describe self-imposed standards for

retraction. Dr. Roane’s argument that this study did not meet the criterion of “legally defensible

evidence that…people were harmed” reminds the reader of the statement’s assertion that “the

suicide cannot be causally linked to participation in the study decades earlier” (p. 1833). When

Dr. LeBlanc states that “it’s entirely possible that the authors never knew about the intensity of

the spankings” that were described in Anderson Cooper’s CNN series on Kirk (2020, 16:39; see

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 22

Cooper, 2011), one should contrast that with Rekers’ original dissertation upon which Rekers

and Lovaas (1974) was based, where Rekers writes that “our detailed clinical interview with the

child’s parents revealed that Kraig had been severely punished by the father on one occasion for

cross-gender behavior” (1972, p. 160).

The authors of this Statement of Concern articulate four harms originating from of this

paper: (a) Kirk’s mental distress and ultimate suicide, although the authors pointedly note that

“the suicide cannot be causally linked to participation in the study decades earlier” (SEAB &

LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1833), (b) that this study has been used to support conversion therapy, (c) that

this study harms the field of ABA “due to the false impression that may be created that this

article, or the use of conversion therapy is in any way representative of the field” (p. 1834), and

(d) the potential that work like this, with its associations with conversion therapy and aversive

procedures (i.e., abuse), will harm families seeking support “as well as the reputation of the

field” (p. 1834).

Put simply, the authors of the 2020 Statement of Concern engage in an active defense of

Rekers and Lovaas (1974) through their repeated emphasis on the intent of the authors, the

causality of the abuse, and their limited interpretation of the standards of practice in 1974, as

well as the selective omission of relevant information. Although the 2020 Statement of

Concern’s authors argue that they undertook “a detailed examination of all available information

and publications relevant to the paper or the subsequent uses of the paper in alignment with the

Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines,” a number of relevant and readily-available

details have been omitted from the Statement of Concern (SEAB & LeBlanc, 2020, p. 1832).

Furthermore, two of the four harms done by Rekers and Lovaas (1974) as described by SEAB

and LeBlanc (2020) in the Statement of Concern pertain to the reputation of the field. The

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 23

evidence the authors value and the rationales they present, in contrast with the realities of what

happened to this child, are disturbing.

Impact of Rekers and Lovaas (1974). In their discussion of conversion therapy in the

manuscript, SEAB and LeBlanc write that “although SEAB is not a professional association that

could publish a position statement on behalf of the discipline of behavior analysis, as a scientific

organization, SEAB strongly condemns conversion therapy and is fully in opposition of

pseudoscience in all forms” (p. 1833). Reinforcing this explicit connection between conversion

therapy and pseudoscience, Dr. LeBlanc states during the Behavioral Observations podcast that:

Dr. LeBlanc: (20:08)

The Rekers and Lovaas paper has been used as evidence for the term conversion therapy

or changing of sexual preferences…that is, if someone is homosexual, you could convert

them to be heterosexual. And so the subsequent use of the paper is highly problematic.

That is, the term conversion therapy is actually a pseudoscience term. This article has

nothing to do with changing sexual preference. That was not the behaviors that was

targeted and there subsequently hasn't been any evidence to support conversion therapy

as an evidence-based practice. So, when people erroneously use a scientific study as

evidence for something that it does not support, we have a responsibility as a scientific

community to correct those mistaken characterizations. And let me assure you, SEAB has

always been an opponent of pseudoscience in all of its forms. And the notion that a paper

published by us could be so wildly misconstrued and used to support pseudoscientific

efforts is appalling and was part of why we have taken the efforts that we have.

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 24

As has been argued by many scholars and members of the LGBTQ community, the

problem with conversion therapy is not that it’s pseudoscience; the problem with conversion

therapy is that it’s inhumane (e.g., Haldeman, 2002; Ashley, 2020). It’s also critical to note that

the influence of Rekers and Lovaas (1974) has not been limited to its use in support of

conversion therapy, but also a wide range of broader texts surrounding homosexuality and

gender identity. Kirk’s abuse was a cornerstone of Rekers’ curriculum vitae, as “he would

feature or mention Kraig’s case in at least twenty papers, books and chapters in the forty years

following his dissertation” (Burroway, 2011). Kirk’s abuse was then further documented in

Richard Green’s book The “Sissy Boy Syndrome” and the Development of Homosexuality, and

an extensive description of Rekers and Lovaas (1974) has been used as an example of extinction

procedures in Miltenberger’s Behavior Modification: Principles and Procedures from its first

(1997) to sixth (2016) editions. Miltenberger has stated that Rekers and Lovaas (1974) will be

removed from the seventh edition of the book, and that he has asked the publisher to remove the

description of Rekers and Lovaas (1974) from digital versions of the text (R. Miltenberger,

personal communication, November 9, 2020).

To believe in the dignity of every one of our clients, to pledge to support each one with

the utmost standard of care, the ABA community cannot be amoral on the issue of LGBTQ

rights and humanity. Although SEAB and LeBlanc seem to assert that as a scientific

organization, they cannot make such a statement, I fail to see how the promotion of abuse under

the guise of a sound application of behavioral principles does not make a statement of its own.

Conclusion

Before closing, I would note that I have written this document with the knowledge and

information available to me over the brief period of time since this Statement of Concern and

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 25

subsequent podcast were released. Extensive and exceptional work documenting Kirk’s life and

the abuse in Rekers and Lovaas (1974) has already been conducted by Jim Burroway, whose

blog series provides a comprehensive biography of Kirk and his abuse (Burroway, 2011). Any

errors in the current manuscript are completely my own. The story told in the pages of Rekers

and Lovaas (1974) is one of abuse, of hate, of tragedy, and of violence. It has no place in the

scientific literature. It is unethical, and as such, meets the standard for retraction from JABA.

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 26

Revisions

Version 1 (2020, October 23, 6:25 pm). Original version uploaded to Open Science Framework

(OSF).

Version 2 (2020, October 23, 6:47 pm). Immediately after uploading, I realized that Rekers

(1977) was indeed cited but not described in the Statement of Concern. I updated the text

and added a pull quote to illustrate this point.

Version 3 (2020, October 23, 9:31 pm). I removed a misplaced period, fixed numbering in a list,

and noticed that I had referred to Kirk as a “boy” instead of a “child” near the end of the

manuscript. I corrected this to match my use of non-binary nouns and pronouns.

Version 4 (2020, November 6, morning). Dr. Rose Jaffery notified me, based on information

provided by Jeff Newman, that APA had voted to remove homosexuality from the DSM

in 1973. Jeff also highlighted Drescher (2015), which is an excellent overview of this

history. I was unaware of the timing or depth of this history, and have revised the

document to emphasize this error in the Statement of Concern and its implications for

JABA’s rationale. I corrected typographical errors, edited repetitive language, updated

the title page, added references to Rekers’ dissertation, and added this revisions section.

Version 5 (2020, November 11, afternoon). I spoke to Kirk’s sister, Maris Ehlers, to confirm the

appropriateness of (a) using Kirk’s real name and (b) determine the appropriate pronouns

to use for Kirk. As a result, I updated the document to use Kirk’s real name and refer to

him using “he/his” pronouns. I also received and integrated feedback from Dr. Melissa

Collier-Meek regarding the structure of the paper. I added a more comprehensive

introduction, an abstract, and references to the Jim Burroway’s work, the Council of

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 27

Science Editors, and other sources. I made other miscellaneous changes, including the

addition of Figure 1.

Version 6 (2020, November 12, morning). I corrected some citation styles and added reference to

Miltenberger’s Behavior Modification textbook. I added pull-quotes from Jim

Burroway’s journalism regarding the token economy and the physical abuse associated

with it. I added/modified a lot of other content to restructure and make the paper closer to

publication-ready.

Please note that a set of PDFs which explicitly delineates the changes from version to version are

available on this project’s OSF page: https://osf.io/vytw6/.

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 28

References

Ashley, F. (2020). Homophobia, conversion therapy, and care models for trans youth: defending

the gender-affirmative approach. Journal of LGBT Youth, 17(4), 361–383.

https://doi.org/10.1080/19361653.2019.1665610

Bayer, R. (1987). Homosexuality and American psychiatry: The politics of diagnosis. Basic

Books.

Behavior Analyst Certification Board. (2014). Professional and ethical compliance code for

behavior analysts. Author. https://www.bacb.com/wp-content/bacb-compliance-code

Burroway, J. (2011, June 7). What are little boys made of?: An investigation of an experimental

program to train boys to be boys. Box Turtle Bulletin.

http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/what-are-little-boys-made-of1

Cicoria, M. (Host). (2020, October 22). Inside JABA #5: SEAB Statement of Concern Issued for

Rekers and Lovaas (1974) [Audio podcast episode].

https://behavioralobservations.com/inside-jaba-5-seab-statement-of-concern-issued-for-

rekers-and-lovaas-1974/

Cooper, A. (Presenter). (2011). The sissy boy experiment [TV series episodes]. In A. Cooper

(Presenter), Anderson Cooper 360. CNN.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0922202D15EFE01A

Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2007). Applied behavior analysis (2nd ed.).

Pearson.

COPE Council. (2019). COPE Guidelines: Retraction Guidelines.

https://doi.org/10.24318/cope.2019.1.4

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 29

Council of Science Editors, Editorial Policy Committee. (2018). CSE’s white paper on

promoting integrity in scientific journal publications.

https://www.councilscienceeditors.org/resource-library/editorial-policies/white-paper-on-

publication-ethics/

Drabiak-Syed, K. (2010). Lessons from Havasupai Tribe v. Arizona State University Board of

Regents: Recognizing group, cultural, and dignity harms as legitimate risks warranting

integration into research practice. Journal of Health and Biomedical Law, 6(2), 175-226.

https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/jhbio6&i=183

Drescher, J. (2015). Out of DSM: Depathologizing homosexuality. Behavioral Sciences, 5(4),

565-575. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs5040565

Haldeman, D. C. (2002). Therapeutic antidotes: Helping gay and bisexual men recover from

conversion therapies. Journal of Gay & Lesbian Psychotherapy, 5(3-4), 117–130.

https://doi.org/10.1300/J236v05n03_08

Krugman, S. (1986). The Willowbrook hepatitis studies revisited: Ethical aspects. Reviews of

Infectious Diseases, 8(1), 157–162. https://doi.org/10.1093/clinids/8.1.157

Miltenberger, R. G. (2016). Behavior modification: Principles and procedures (6th ed.).

Cengage Learning.

Nordyke, N. S., Baer, D. M., Etzel, B. C., & LeBlanc, J. M. (1977). Implications of the

stereotyping and modification of sex role. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 10(3),

553–557. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1977.10-553

Paul, C., & Brookes, B. (2015). The rationalization of unethical research: Revisionist accounts of

the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and the New Zealand “Unfortunate Experiment.” American

Journal of Public Health, 105(10), e12–e19. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302720

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 30

Rekers, G. A. (1977). Atypical gender development and psychosocial adjustment. Journal of

Applied Behavior Analysis, 10(3), 559–571. https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1977.10-559

Rekers, G. A., & Lovaas, O. I. (1974). Behavioral treatment of deviant sex-role behaviors in a

male child. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 7(2), 173–190.

https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1974.7-173

The Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, & LeBlanc, L. A. (2020). Editor’s Note:

Societal changes and expression of concern about Rekers and Lovaas' (1974) Behavioral

Treatment of Deviant Sex‐Role Behaviors in a Male Child. Journal of Applied Behavior

Analysis, 53(4), 1830–1836. https://doi.org/10.1002/jaba.768

Winkler, R. C. (1977). What types of sex-role behavior should behavior modifiers promote?

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 10(3), 549–552.

https://doi.org/10.1901/jaba.1977.10-549

RESPONSE TO STATEMENT OF CONCERN 31

Figure 1

Timeline of Events Relevant to Rekers and Lovaas (1974)

1952 – DSM-I published, lists homosexuality as “sociopathic personality disturbance”

1965 – Kirk Murphy is born

1968 – DSM-II published, revises homosexuality as a “sexual deviation”

1969 – Stonewall riots take place

1970 – Presentation at APA Annual Meeting by Nathaniel McConaghy on aversive techniques

for sexual deviation interrupted by LGBTQ demonstrators

1970 – Rekers and Lovaas abuse Kirk Murphy

1971 – “Gay is Good” panel convened at APA Annual Meeting

1972 – “Gay, Proud, and Healthy” exhibition held at APA Annual Meeting

1972 – Rekers defends his dissertation, which describes abuse of Kirk and four other children

1973 – APA’s Board of Trustees and Members vote to remove homosexuality from DSM

1974 – Rekers and Lovaas (1974) is published

1975 – JABA receives critical responses of Rekers and Lovaas (1974) from two different sets of

authors: (a) Winkler and (b) Nordyke, Baer, Etzel, and LeBlanc

1977 – Winker (1977) and Nordyke et al. (1977) are published alongside rejoinder from Rekers

(1977)

2003 – Kirk Murphy commits suicide

2011 – Jim Barroway publishes six-part series describing the abuse of Kirk Murphy in Rekers

and Lovaas (1974) and Kirk’s life afterwards, alongside Anderson Cooper broadcast

2020 – JABA publishes Statement of Concern, does not retract Rekers and Lovaas (1974)