Relapse Prevention

Description of the Strategy

Alan Marlatt and Judith Gordon developed relapse prevention (RP) as a response to their concerns over the steadily plummeting survival of treatment gains once clients discontinued alcoholism treatment if no further intervention was implemented. Their observations revealed that treatment, with all of its costs and benefits, was attenuated over time. A significant number of clients who responded to a variety of treatments for addictive behaviors could expect to reach abstinence for a certain period to time, only to lose control of the target behaviors again following cessation of treatment.

Thus, the primary assumption of RP evolved: It is problematic to expect the effects of a treatment that is designed to moderate or eliminate an undesirable behavior to endure beyond ...

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