Dr. Deirdre Walker Abernathy, Ph. D., BCBA, LBA

Establishing Interactions LLC Practice Specializations and Services

Dr. Abernathy is a practicing behavior analyst and is the founder and owner of Establishing Interactions LLC, a specialty private practice. She takes incoming clients aged 12 months to 12 years, although she works with both children and adults. She currently has over 20 years of experience working with children with a wide range of language, social, emotional, learning, and behavioral needs. She develops and conducts scientific, research-based, and data-driven systems for making and tracking improvements in learning. She specializes in breaking down harder or more complex skills across skill domains into small components, which are then sequenced together to promote mastery in learning.  Parents often contact her who want enrichment support for their children in certain subjects or who desire help with progression in any developmental area or across areas. She then assesses that area or areas and creates a specialized and individualized program for the child.

Dr. Abernathy has a Ph. D. in Education in Counseling. Her doctoral program’s accreditation was by CACREP, which is the most desirable and the most difficult accreditation for any program to obtain in the field.  Her Ph.D. program included a dual emphasis on Education in Counseling and Counseling Psychology, where it followed the coursework and training requirements for the American Psychological Association (APA) standards for Counseling Psychology.  Her doctoral work was focused on using behavior analytic techniques and cognitive-behavioral therapy in counseling practice and research.  Her dissertation, which focused on using behavior analytic techniques to teach counselors counseling skills, published by ProQuest, is titled A Behavioral Analysis of Counselor Supervision: A Multiple Baseline Design. She received her Master’s in Education in Counseling from the University of Missouri—St. Louis as well as her B.A. in Psychology along with a Certificate in Trauma Studies from the University of Missouri--St. Louis in conjunction with Pierre Laclede Honors College with summa cum laude honors.  She also has completed graduate work in behavior analysis and is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) certified by the BACB and Licensed Behavior Analyst (LBA) in Missouri. She completed her initial behavior analysis coursework and training in New York directly under Dr. Vincent Carbone, the founder of the Carbone Clinic, where she learned the techniques for specializing in Applied Verbal Behavior, or how to emphasize spoken language in every facet of an Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) program. She also has taught the graduate courses for Group Therapy and Theories of Counseling and Psychotherapy, while she currently guest lectures occasionally.

Dr. Abernathy sees clients all over the U.S., through a combination of teletherapy and direct service.  She provides direct service to clients in St. Louis, Chicago, Denver, L.A., San Francisco, New York, and New Orleans on a rotating travel schedule.  Furthermore, Dr. Abernathy has experience in the diagnosis and/or treatment of children and adolescents with social, emotional, communication, learning, and behavioral challenges including, but not limited to: ADHD and executive functioning skills challenges, Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Down syndrome, Fragile X, cerebal palsy, social (pragmatic) communication disorder, OCD and other anxiety disorders, PANS/PANDAS, oppositional defiant disorder, combined behavioral and emotional difficulties, apraxia and other expressive communication difficulties, children with rare chromosomal disorders, and children without any diagnosis that just need social, emotional, learning, or behavioral help.

Dr. Abernathy’s clinical interests and specializations within her practice are a specialty in working with children who are not progressing with other approaches (or even with other behavior plans) or who have reached a plateau in any area.  Dr. Abernathy conducts developmental assessments for children with delays with or without an official diagnosis and can design and supervise a therapy program designed specifically around the child’s area of need or areas of need.  She also has experience teaching initial language skills to children who are nonverbal or minimally verbal, or who are not progressing to their capability or in their development in this area.