Question

Describe in detail the exposure therapies of systematic desensitization, flooding, and modeling in the treatment of specific phobias.

Answer 1

systematic desensitization is an important part of exposure therapy.it is mainly used in patients with PTSD,post traumatic stress disorders.They eliminate lot of anxiety initially in the therapy.relaxation is the main techniques used in this therapy.The patient is first asked to do relaxation exercises and breathing techniques are used.The first step is to ask the patient to relax and once he is relaxed the therapist will introduce a situation,starting from the least anxious,once the patient starts to feel anxious the therapist asks the patient to completely erase what is in his mind and start again.for example people who were in war situations or conflict situations require this therapy.The therapist asks the patient to start slowly thinking about the sounds of the war zone,once he exhibits anxiety ,he is asked to start all over again.This is a very effective method in use of exposure therapy.

Flooding techniques is used in behaviour therapies and exposure therapy.it mainly deals with phobias one has or developed through years from childhood experience.it is also referred to as a psychotheraptic technique.it uses the technique of exposure.in this situation the patient is confronted with what fear or trauma they had and where the stimulus that provoked the original trauma is present.for example one may have a fear or phobia of crossing roads as they could have witnessed an accident.the techniques is to expose them to do more of that action to eliminate that anxiety.first they would retaliate to cross the road but eventually they condition themselves to the environment and fear slowly fades away.

Modeling is form of behaviour therapy where the patient is asked to observe others in a situation that creates anxiety for them.it is learned through observation and behaviour of others.people learn new skills through modelling technique.this is based on social learning theory.for example students will be asked to watch or observe students in a situation of helping people with disability to reinforce the thought of helping others and compassion ,watch skill based training methods to learn a new skill such as acting or public speaking.