Manualized Behavior Therapy

Theoretical Basis of Manualized Behavior Therapy

Behavior therapy is an orientation to clinical work that is aligned philosophically with an experimental approach to the study of human behavior. Behavior therapy adherents believe that problem behaviors seen in clinical settings can best be understood in light of principles derived from psychological experimentation and learning theory. Child behavior therapists rely on the scientific study of behavior and typically focus on overt behavior.

For the behavior therapist, behavior is assumed to be lawful and a function of specifiable antecedent, organismic, behavioral, and consequent conditions. In the initial stages of therapy, the therapist uses a functional, idiographic assessment to identify the conditions associated with the clients' problematic behaviors. This assessment leads directly to specific maladaptive behaviors, antecedents that lead to those behaviors, and consequences that follow the behaviors and serve to maintain them.

In behavior therapy, patients are taught new behaviors and skills to foster positive behavior change. Behavior therapists have developed standardized treatment strategies, based on behavior principles, to alter problematic behavior. The use of manuals to guide assessment and therapy standardizes treatment across therapists and clients with similar clinical presentations. As a practical matter, treatment manual applications are often tailored to the individual client.

History of Behavior Therapy and Applications for Children

Behavior therapy interventions for children have a short history. Early behavioral interventions for childhood psychopathology were drawn either directly from empirical research with animals during the 1960s or from adult interventions that had been developed using basic learning principles. Early behavior therapy research narrowly focused on the usefulness of conditioning and deconditioning fear and avoidant behaviors. Behavior problems in children were theorized to be a function of a deficient learning history, and early interventions focused on behavioral interventions to teach appropriate responses. Over time, researchers began to realize the complexity of the child's environment and how difficult it was to gain control of it.

...