behavioural treatments of phobias

• Extinction: the process


  • Overwhelming the individual's senses with the item that causes the most anxiety but shows that there is no harm
  • One session is usually 2-3 hours, some only need 1 session
  • No option for avoidance so quickly learns that the phobic stimulus is harmless so fear diminishes
  • A learned response is extinguished when the conditioned stimulus is encountered without the unconditioned stimulus
• process 3: exposure

  exposed to phobic stimulus when relaxed. takes place over several sessions starting at bottom of hierarchy.
• Proposed by Mowrer 1960



  states that phobias are acquired through classical conditioning and maintained through operant conditioning.
• Flooding



  Involves exposure but without the build up
• systematic desensitisation 


  designed to gradually reduce phobic anxiety through classical conditioning by relaxing. a new response to phobic stimulus is learnt which is paired with relaxation -> counterconditioning
• Process 1: Anxiety hierarchy

  Anxiety hierarchy -> contrasted by patient and therapist, situations that provoke anxiety in order of most frightening to least frightening
• in vivo - would be exposed to the stimulus
• in vitro - would imagine exposure to the stimulus
• AO3: Systematic desensitisation (WEAKNESS)

  Some researchers would argue that a phobia is a symptom of an underlying condition and that when one phobia is removed by Systematic Desensitisation, another phobia will emerge and take its place. This is known as symptom substitution and it is argued that the therapy is therefore not curing the actual underlying cause of the phobia, merely the symptoms.
• AO3: Systematic desensitisation (STRENGTH)

  42 patients with arachnophobia who were given three 45 minute systematic desensitisation sessions. When they were examied three months and 33 days later, the systematic desensitisation group was less fearful than the control group. this proves us that SD is a valid way of treating phobias and works effectively
• AO3: systematic desensitisation (STRENGTH)

  Systematic desensitisation is much more ethical than flooding as it involves gradual exposure to the object the patient fears. This means the treatment is far less stressful for a participant and should not cause damage.
• AO3: Systematic desensitisation (WEAKNESS)

  The method used in SD allows the patient to be slowly and gradually introduced to their fear. However, in real life no such control exists, such as a spider crawling on someone with arachnophobia without warning. This means it is hard to generalise the method to working in real life, meaning it has low mundane realism
• AO3: Flooding (STRENGTH)

  Flooding has been shown to work: Joseph Wolpe (1970). He took a girl who was scared of cars and drove her around for 4 hours.At first, the girl was hysterical but she calmed down when he realised that she was in no danger. Afterwards, her phobia disappeared: she learned to enjoy car rides
• AO3: Flooding (WEAKNESS)

  Some people will not able able to tolerate the high levels of anxiety induced by the therapy, and are therefore at risk of exiting the therapy before they are calm and relaxed. This is likely to reinforce rather than weaken the phobia
• AO3: Flooding (STRENGTH)

  Real life situation (therefore, high ecological validity)Exposure to therapy and flooding presents the sufferer with unavoidable exposure and this is what often happens in real life.It is argued that this therapy better prepares sufferers for occasions when they may be confronted unexpectedly with the object / situation they fear, with no way in getting away from it.
• AO3: Flooding (WEAKNESS)

  would be unethical as exposing people at such high levels of anxiety where they do not feel in control is thought to be less ethical compared to systemic desensitisation where the patient is in control of the situation