Phobias

Question 1

What is a phobia?

Answer 1

An anxiety disorder which has negative effects on an individual - physical and emotional

Question 2

How can classical conditioning explain phobias?

Answer 2

Phobia occurs due to NS being paired with UCS - e.g spider paired with unpleasant event

Question 3

How can SLT explain phobias?

Answer 3

May learn the phobia through observing others and imitate that behaviour

Question 4

What is the treatment for phobias?

Answer 4

Systematic desensitisation, flooding and implosion

Question 5

What is systematic desensitisation based on?

Answer 5

Idea of reciprocal inhibition - can’t be anxious and calm at the same time

Question 6

What does SD involve?

Answer 6

• Make a hierarchy of events which the individual will gradually be exposed to
• Taught relaxation techniques to use at each stage of the hierarchy
• Once they become less anxious at a stage of the hierarchy, they will move onto the next one and repeat the process

Question 7

Evaluation of SD

Answer 7

+ ethical - not exposed to extreme fear provoking activities

• usefulness - only useful for phobias involving an object - wouldn’t be useful for GAD which can have no trigger for the anxious feeling

Question 8

Who came up with flooding?

Answer 8

Thomas Stampfl

Question 9

What is flooding based on?

Answer 9

Idea that an individual will eventually realise they are not going to be harmed by their fear, and acknowledging this will reduce their anxiety

Question 10

What is flooding?

Answer 10

Facing fear for a prolonged period of time

Question 11

What is implosion?

Answer 11

Imagining fearful scenario

Question 12

Evaluation of flooding/implosion

Answer 12

+ Wolpe - used it to cure a girl of her fear of cars - locked her in a car for a few hours and drove round

• Barrett - tried to use it for a girl with a fear of snakes - girl ended up gaining insomnia after she imagined a snake when she closed her eyes, as instructed to do so in therapy