Hidden Nazi past: Ole Ivar Lovaas during the German occupation of Norway

Abstract

Ole Ivar Lovaas – a Norwegian-born professor of psychology at UCLA – is considered a pioneer in the development of interventions for autistic children based on Applied Behaviour Analysis. According to previous accounts, Lovaas and his family were forced farm workers during the German occupation of Norway between 1940 and 1945, when Lovaas was 13–18 years old. This article shows that the Løvaas family were in fact members of the collaborationist fascist party Nasjonal Samling. His father, Ernst Albert Løvaas, was a prominent leader in the propaganda apparatus of the German-installed fascist government. Ole Ivar Lovaas himself was an active participant in, and a local leader of, the fascist youth movement. The article concludes by comparing these revelations about Lovaas to previous similar revelations about another important figure in the history of autism, Hans Asperger.