Evaluation

• Cost-effective

  One strength of flooding is that it is highly cost-effective:

  • A therapy is cost-effective if it is clinically effective and not expensive
  • Flooding can work in as little as one session compared to the multiple required by SD to achieve the same result
  • Therefore, more people can be treated at the same cost with flooding than with SD or other therapies
• Traumatic

  One limitation of flooding is that it is a highly unpleasant experience:

  • Confronting phobias in an extreme form provokes extreme anxiety
  • Schumacher et al found that participants and therapists rated flooding as significantly more stressful than SD
  • The traumatic nature of flooding means that attrition (dropout) rates are high
  • Therefore, therapists may avoid using this treatment