Phobias: Behavioural Approach

Test yourself on Phobias: Behavioural Approach

Test your knowledge with free interactive questions on Seneca — used by over 10 million students.

The Behavioural Approach to Phobias

According to the behavioural approach, people develop phobias due to a combination of classical and operant conditioning. This is known as the two-process model.

Classical conditioning

Classical conditioning involves learning by association.
Like Pavlov’s dog associating a bell with food, people can learn to associate a previously neutral stimulus with a feeling of fear.

Little Albert

A famous example of this was the experiment on an 11-month old boy, ‘little Albert’ (Watson & Rayner, 1920).
Albert saw an animal and simultaneously heard a loud scary noise; through classical conditioning he learned to fear the animal that he had previously liked.

Operant conditioning

Operant conditioning is based around different types of reinforcement and punishment.
Both types of reinforcement strengthen a behaviour, while both types of punishment weaken or reduce the behaviour.

Negative reinforcement

Negative reinforcement is when the absence of unpleasant things strengthens a behaviour, such as switching off a loud noise.
This is important for phobias: when a person avoids the stimulus they fear (e.g. flying, snakes or clowns), this strengthens the phobia.
This is because the absence of the feared stimulus makes them feel better, and so the action of avoiding it is negatively reinforced.

Two-process model

The two-process model (Mowrer, 1947) explains the origins of phobias in terms of a combination of classical and operant conditioning:
- Classical conditioning is responsible for the initial learning, associating a previously neutral stimulus with fear.
- Operant conditioning reinforces the fear because every time someone avoids the feared stimulus, they feel calmer.

Classical Conditioning in Treating Phobias

Some behavioural therapists use classical conditioning techniques developed by Ivan Pavlov to try to change their clients' behaviours.

Classical conditioning

One type of behaviour therapy utilises classical conditioning techniques.
Therapists using these techniques believe that dysfunctional behaviours are conditioned responses.
These therapists apply the conditioning principles developed by Ivan Pavlov. They try to recondition their clients and so change their behaviour.

Counterconditioning

One classical conditioning therapeutic technique that's commonly used is counterconditioning. This is where a client learns a new response to a stimulus that has previously elicited an undesirable behaviour.
Two counterconditioning techniques are aversive conditioning and exposure therapy.

Aversive conditioning

Aversive conditioning uses an unpleasant stimulus to stop an undesirable behaviour.
Therapists apply this technique to eliminate addictive behaviours, such as smoking, nail biting, and drinking.
In aversion therapy, clients will typically engage in a specific behaviour (such as nail biting) and at the same time are exposed to something unpleasant, such as a mild electric shock or a bad taste.
After repeated associations between the unpleasant stimulus and the behaviour, the client can learn to stop the unwanted behaviour.

Exposure therapy

In exposure therapy, a therapist tries to treat clients’ fears or anxiety by presenting them with the object or situation that causes their problem. The idea is that they will eventually get used to it.
This can be done via reality, imagination, or virtual reality.

Behavioural Treatments for Phobias

The principles of classical and operant conditioning can also be used to treat phobias through flooding or systematic desensitisation.

Flooding

Flooding, also called exposure therapy, involves exposing the phobic individual to the thing they fear, changing the association they have via classical conditioning:
- They are taught relaxation techniques by a therapist.
- They are exposed to the highly feared stimulus, e.g. a snake.
- They become very distressed.
- They use the relaxation techniques and after a while, they feel less distressed.

Systematic desensitisation

Systematic desensitisation also tries to change an individual’s associations:
- The individual works to draw up a fear hierarchy.
- They are exposed to the first (least feared) item on their hierarchy, e.g. a pencil drawing of a snake.
- The therapist helps them use relaxation techniques and after a while, they feel less distressed.
- The patient then moves onto the next (more fearful) level of their hierarchy.

Limitations

A flaw with flooding is that the early stage can be very distressing.
Systematic desensitisation is slower but less distressing for the individual.
The first few stages of the hierarchy could involve images or videos rather than the real stimulus.