Ole Ivar Lovaas

Who was Ole Ivar Lovaas?

Ole Ivar Løvaas PhD was a Norwegian-American clinical psychologist at UCLA. He is considered to be one of the fathers of applied behavior analysis through his development of the Lovaas technique and the first to provide evidence that the behavior of autistic children can be modified through teaching. In 1999, the U.S. Office of the Surgeon General described Lovaas's techniques as having been shown to be efficacious at "reducing inappropriate behavior and in increasing communication, learning, and appropriate social behavior", based on thirty years of studies. In recent times, his technique is either called Early intensive behavior intervention or the Lovaas model of Applied behavior analysis.