Cultural Sensitivity in the Application of Behavior Principles to Education

Cultural sensitivity is recommended in education, but to our knowledge it has not been defined operationally. We found no research suggesting that behavioral interventions work differently with students differing in ethnicity, gender, or religion, although socialization may play a role in shaping behavior, selecting or responding to particular reinforcers, and judging the acceptability of interventions. Differences in response to behavioral interventions based on cultural identification may exist, but we found no evidence suggesting that behavioral practices are more likely to be effective if they are based on the cultural markers we examined. For behavioral educators, cultural sensitivity requires respect for the individual student based on scientific evidence measuring the effects of scientific interventions in achieving socially valid behavioral objectives for individual students and their parents.