[2] Behaviour therapy does not involve one specific method, but it has a wide range of techniques that can be used to treat a person's psychological problems.
From the time that this became a feature of human life there must have been occasions when a man complained of his ills to another who advised or persuaded him of a course of action.
Possibly the first occurrence of the term "behavior therapy" was in a 1953 research project by B.F. Skinner, Ogden Lindsley, Nathan Azrin and Harry C.
[10] The paper talked about operant conditioning and how it could be used to help improve the functioning of people who were diagnosed with chronic schizophrenia.
[15] While the concept had its share of advocates and critics in the west, its introduction in the Asian setting, particularly in India in the early 1970s[16] and its grand success were testament to the famous Indian psychologist H. Narayan Murthy's enduring commitment to the principles of behavioural therapy and biofeedback.
They do not look at behaviour disorders as something a person has, but consider that it reflects how learning has influenced certain people to behave in a certain way in certain situations.
This acronym stands for behaviour, affective responses, sensory reactions, imagery, cognitive processes, interpersonal relationships and drug use.
Just a few of the many problems that behaviour therapy have functionally analyzed include intimacy in couples relationships,[38][39][40] forgiveness in couples,[41] chronic pain,[42] stress-related behaviour problems of being an adult child of a person with an alcohol use disorder,[43] anorexia,[44] chronic distress,[45] substance abuse,[46] depression,[47] anxiety,[48] insomnia[49] and obesity.
[3] Relaxation training involves clients learning to lower arousal to reduce their stress by tensing and releasing certain muscle groups throughout their body.
The modelling process involves a person being subjected to watching other individuals who demonstrate behaviour that is considered adaptive and that should be adopted by the client.
[65] Some other techniques that have been used in behaviour therapy are contingency contracting, response costs, token economies, biofeedback, and using shaping and grading task assignments.
Response costs is the punishment side of token economies where there is a loss of a reward or privilege after someone performs an undesirable behaviour.
One form of behaviour therapy, habit reversal training, has been found to be highly effective for treating tics.
One form of behaviour therapy (habit reversal training) has been found to be highly effective for treating tics.
[75] Desensitization has also been successfully applied to other issues such as dealing with anger, if a person has trouble sleeping and certain speech disorders.
Fears are thought to develop through observational learning, and so positive modelling, when a person's behaviour is imitated, can used to counter these effects.
[81] Exposure and prevention procedure techniques can be used to treat people who have anxiety problems as well as any fears or phobias.
[86] VRT has also been applied to help people with substance abuse problems reduce their responsiveness to certain cues that trigger their need to use drugs.
[89] The response cost technique has been used to successfully address a variety of behaviours such as smoking, overeating, stuttering, and psychotic talk.
[90] Systematic desensitization has been shown to successfully treat phobias about heights, driving, insects as well as any anxiety that a person may have.
If these things are severe, the person's response to completing small steps will not be of importance to them, because they don't consider the success an accomplishment.
[67] Generally, in those without severe depression or fear, this technique has been successful, as completion of simpler activities builds their confidences and allows them to progress to more complex situations.
[68][non-primary source needed] Token economies have been shown to be effective when treating patients in psychiatric wards who had chronic schizophrenia.
[97] As of March 2022, there are over 900 randomized trials of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy[98] and 60 mediational studies of the ACT literature.
[100] As the result of multiple randomized trials of ACT by the World Health Organization, WHO now distribute ACT-based self-help for "anyone who experiences stress, wherever they live, and whatever their circumstances.
"[101] As of March 2022, a number of different organizations have stated that Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is empirically supported in certain areas or as a whole according to their standards.
12), The World Health Organization, The United Kingdom National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), Australian Psychological Society, Netherlands Institute of Psychologists: Sections of Neuropsychology and Rehabilitation, Sweden Association of Physiotherapists, SAMHSA's National Registry of Evidence-based Programs and Practices, California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare, and the U.S. Veterans Affairs/DoD.
[105] A recent review of the research, supports the notion that the use of behavioural activation is clinically important for the treatment of depression.
Recent efforts have used radical behavioural concepts to interpret a number of clinical phenomena including forgiveness.
[41] A review study published in 2008, concluded that at the time, third-generation behavioral psychotherapies did not meet the criteria for empirically supported treatments.