ABA Therapy Providers: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Questions This Section Answers

• Which ABA therapy provider leads AI recommendation coverage in October 2026, and how has its lead changed?
• Which brands recorded the largest coverage declines from the July 2026 baseline?

Action Behavior Centers remains the coverage leader in October 2026 with valid recommendation coverage of 33.3%, down from 54.0% in July 2026. Its lead over the second-ranked brand has narrowed from 40.3 percentage points in July 2026 to 19.6 percentage points in October 2026. Behavioral Innovations ranks third at 11.8%.

Action Behavior Centers recorded the largest coverage decline from baseline, falling 20.7 percentage points from 54.0% in July 2026 to 33.3% in October 2026. Behavioral Innovations recorded a decline of 18.0 percentage points over the same period, Hopebridge fell 13.5 percentage points from 31.1% in July 2026 to 17.6% in October 2026, and Trumpet Behavioral Health fell 5.2 percentage points from 6.2% to 1.0%. No brand recorded a coverage increase beyond normal month-to-month variation across the four-month series.

The benchmark began with 677 prompt-surface observations in October 2026 and produced 102 qualified observations after qualification.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI surface families with at least one qualified observation: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode. The July 2026 series reached four families, and the October 2026 series reached all six. Those intermediate changes are not part of the baseline-to-current comparison.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending ABA Therapy Providers

Research Scope and Qualification

Questions This Section Answers

• How did the October 2026 benchmark funnel narrow from 677 prompt-surface observations to 102 qualified observations?
• What is the public denominator used for ABA therapy brand-level percentages?

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design. The funnel below shows how observations were qualified.

Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. See the AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology for full details.

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which ABA therapy brands rank highest by valid recommendation coverage in October 2026?
• How does a brand's presence rate differ from its valid recommendation coverage in the standings?

This table shows the primary current-month benchmark view for October 2026, with brands sorted by valid recommendation coverage.

How to Read the Standings

Presence rate is the share of qualified observations where the brand is mentioned in any form. Valid recommendation coverage is the share of qualified observations where the brand appears in a valid recommendation shortlist. Top-three rate is the share where the brand appears in the top three positions, and rank-one rate is the share where it appears first. Net sentiment describes benchmark framing within observations where the brand appears, not customer sentiment.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• Which ABA therapy brands moved beyond normal month-to-month variation since the July 2026 baseline?
• Did any brand record a significant coverage increase over the four-month series?

This table shows the change in valid recommendation coverage from the baseline month (July 2026) to the current month (October 2026).

Month over month, Behavioral Innovations declined from 24.6% in September 2026 to 11.8% in October 2026, a drop of 12.8 percentage points beyond normal variation. Action Behavior Centers declined from 43.4% in September 2026 to 33.3% in October 2026, a drop of 10.1 percentage points within normal month-to-month variation. LEARN Behavioral rose from 4.9% in September 2026 to 8.8% in October 2026, a gain of 3.9 percentage points within normal variation.

No Significant Coverage Increase

No brand recorded a coverage increase beyond normal month-to-month variation from the July 2026 baseline. BlueSprig Pediatrics held flat at 13.7% from July 2026 to October 2026. LEARN Behavioral recorded the largest point increase among stable brands, moving from 8.1% in July 2026 to 8.8% in October 2026, a gain of 0.7 percentage points within normal variation.

Largest Decline: Action Behavior Centers

Action Behavior Centers declined from 54.0% in July 2026 to 33.3% in October 2026, a drop of 20.7 percentage points beyond normal month-to-month variation. Presence rate fell from 78.3% in July 2026 to 51.0% in October 2026, a decline of 27.3 percentage points beyond normal variation. Top-three rate moved from 42.9% in July 2026 to 32.4% in October 2026, and rank-one rate from 27.3% to 22.6% over the same period. The brand declined in each of the two most recent months, from 43.4% in September 2026 to 33.3% in October 2026.

Category Leader: Action Behavior Centers

Action Behavior Centers held the top position in every month of the historical record, with valid recommendation coverage of 33.3% in October 2026. Its lead over the next closest brand, BlueSprig Pediatrics at 13.7% and Behavioral Innovations at 11.8%, stands at 19.6 and 21.5 percentage points respectively. Presence rate moved from 78.3% in July 2026 to 51.0% in October 2026, a change of 27.3 percentage points. Top-three rate moved from 42.9% to 32.4%, and rank-one rate from 27.3% to 22.6% over the same period.

Among the stable brands, LEARN Behavioral posted the largest gain, moving from 8.1% in July 2026 to 8.8% in October 2026. Autism Learning Partners declined 0.9 percentage points across the series, and Acorn Health declined 1.4 percentage points, both within normal month-to-month variation.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How prominently do the leading ABA therapy brands appear in top-three and rank-one positions?
• Which brand maintained coverage while improving its top-three placement rate?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. The table below shows placement rates for the leading brands in October 2026 and how those compare with July 2026.

Close coverage levels can still hide different first-position rates. BlueSprig Pediatrics held coverage at 13.7% across the series while raising its top-three rate from 5.6% in July 2026 to 11.8% in October 2026, yet its rank-one rate remains low, edging from 0.6% in July 2026 to 1.0% in October 2026.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• What buyer-intent classes appear in the qualified ABA therapy observations?
• Which intent categories have no qualified observations yet?

In both July 2026 and October 2026, all qualified observations fell into the Brand Recommendation class.

The current public series measures brand recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the pricing and value or multi-brand comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

Questions This Section Answers

• Who has led ABA therapy recommendation coverage across the four measurements?
• Which month recorded the largest coverage movement, and for which brand?

This is an evergreen benchmark URL. New measurements are added to the same report.

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and, where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure market share, attributable sales, every possible AI response, organic-search ranking, social mention volume, private or sponsored channels, or causality from a metric movement alone. It records changes in how AI and search surfaces present brands within prompt-level observations.

Top 10 Cited Domains

Questions This Section Answers

• Which domains are cited most often across AI and search surfaces in the ABA therapy benchmark?
• Which ABA therapy provider domains appear among the most-cited sources?

The benchmark recorded 5,528 citations across 1,722 unique domains in October 2026. The table below shows the ten most-cited domains, their citation counts, share of total citations, and which AI platforms cited each domain.

Citations are concentrated in a small number of domains: the ten most-cited domains account for roughly 37.0% of all citations. Three tracked brands' own domains appear in the top 10: actionbehavior.com ranks fourth, hopebridge.com ranks seventh, and learnbehavioral.com ranks ninth. Major platform and social sources dominate the list, including google.com, youtube.com, reddit.com, and facebook.com. Employment and community organization sites such as indeed.com, goodwillks.org, and wichitahabitat.org also appear, reflecting the range of sources AI systems draw on for this vertical.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index is an evergreen industry benchmark that tracks how AI and search surfaces present brands in response to natural-language discovery prompts. It is updated monthly to the same report.

• AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Visibility Authority Value

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