Behavior Therapy

Description of the Strategy

The term behavior therapy is said to have been coined by Hans Eysenck in 1952. The term, intended as a means of describing therapeutic strategies derived from learning theory, did not come into widespread usage until the late 1950s. Joseph Wolpe later defined behavior therapy as the systematic application of principles derived from learning theory to the rational modification of abnormal or undesirable behavior. In the most inclusive sense, behavior refers to both overt (directly observable) and covert (cognition, emotion, and physiological) responses. Behavior therapy encompasses a vast rubric of techniques designed to modify behavior—perhaps the most widely recognized of which being relaxation training, systematic desensitization, extinction, modeling, and contingency management. Although there has been debate among certain authors, therapeutic approaches derived from research on operant as well as respondent (classical) conditioning research are generally included under the label behavior therapy.

The publication of B. F. Skinner's Science and Human Behavior in 1953 and Joseph Wolpe's Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition in 1958 did much to advance the integration of clinical psychology and learning theory and set the stage for behavior therapy to take hold as a powerful and efficient approach to improving the lives of adults and children evincing all manner of dysfunction. In 1963, the journal Behaviour, Research, and Therapy began circulation. The Association for Advancement of Behavior Therapy was formed in 1966 and remains the predominant professional organization within the field.

Behavior therapy differed from earlier psychotherapeutic approaches in its deemphasis on unconscious and/or cognitive processes potentially underlying maladaptive behavior. The medical or “disease” model of psychological symptoms was rejected in favor of functional analysis of antecedents and consequences related to the establishment, maintenance, and generalization of specific behavioral responses. The symptoms of psychological disorders were seen as following the same principles of learning as any adaptive behavior. The influence of the environment on the functioning of the individual was considered paramount. For many, this approach was hailed as a powerful positive force in that sufficient environmental manipulation could lead to profound changes in behavior that previously may have been considered intractable. Behavior therapy emphasizes the setting of clearly defined treatment goals, the objective of the therapist often being to establish specific stimulus-response relationships under which behavior is brought under functional control.

Behavior therapy is a highly individualized approach. Traditional psychotherapeutic approaches often espoused an invariable sequence of treatment, regardless of the specific presenting complaint or individual learning history. Behavior therapy focuses decidedly on the present. The child's behavior is assumed to be maintained by current conditions. The focus is on the child's current environment rather than past conditions to identify factors relevant to the demonstration of problem behavior. Behavior therapy is an action-oriented approach. Necessary changes in the environment are made to produce changes in behavior. Behavior therapy does not rely merely on “talking,” that the clients develop “insight,” or that the “root cause” of the symptoms be uncovered in order for the client to improve.

A pivotal defining feature of behavior therapy that differentiated it from earlier psychotherapeutic approaches was the emphasis placed on empirical validation. The value of behavior therapy techniques was not drawn merely from theoretical association but from scientific evidence. Behavior therapy is intimately tied to the scientific method.

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