Systematic Desensitization

Systematic desensitization therapy is a type of exposure therapy developed to treat phobias, PTSD and anxiety disorders. It involves gradually exposing individuals to feared objects or situations in a controlled environment through relaxation techniques and working up a fear hierarchy. The individual is exposed to fears from least to most frightening until anxiety is reduced.

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Systematic Desensitization

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Ritika Sen

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 Developed by Salter(1949) and Wolpe(1958).

 It’s a type of Exposure therapy based on the principle of Classical Conditioning.

 This was developed to treat phobias, PTSD and anxiety disorder.

 The aim of this therapy is to change the way you respond to objects, people or
situations that trigger feelings of fear and anxiety.
 It involves gradually exposing the individual to the feared object or situation in
a controlled and relaxed environment.
 Systematic desensitization therapy has three main steps:
1. Deep muscle relaxation techniques
2. Creating a fear hierarchy
3. Working up through the fear scale through exposure
 In the first stage of the treatment people with anxiety and fears are taught
breathing exercises and muscle relaxation techniques. Relaxation techniques
are generally these types:
 Deep breathing: It invites you to slow down your breathing and lenghten the
exhale to relax the sympathetic nervous system.
 Muscle relaxation: Progressive Muscle Relaxation(PMR) teaches you to spot
tension in your muscles and relax it. By concentrating on one group at a time,
you learn to tense and relax your muscles, feeling tension melt away as you
release.
 Visualization: This is an exercise that transports you to a place that feels safe
and relaxing.
 In this stage you create a list where you write out all
your fears and rank them on a scale of 1 to 10.
 First you list your level 10 fear(highest amount of
anxiety) than level 1 fear(least amount of anxiety).
After this you brainstorm the remaining fears and list
them in order from 2 to 9.
 After listing you discuss your fears with yours
therapist and work on exposing yourself to them.
 You start from least frightening to highest(level 1 to
level 10).
 The process exposure can be done in three ways:
1. In vitro: The patient imagines being exposed to the object of fear in the mind’s
eye.
2. In vivo: The patient is actually exposed to the fear.
3. VRET(virtual reality exposure therapy):Virtual reality technology mimics real
life situations in a computer generated environment.

 The client repeatedly imagines or confronted by this situation

until it fails to evoke any anxiety, indicating that the therapy has
succeeded.
 Phobias
 PTSD
 Anxiety disorders
 According to Wolpe(1969) this method hasn’t proved beneficial in the
treatment of the following three types of patients:
1. Who experience great difficulty in coming to a state of relaxation.
2. Who give misleading information without giving real information about
the circumstances giving rise to concern.
3. Whose imagination power is weak.

 Anxiety based problems which do not originate from one stimulus

but from many stimuli( as OCD, panic attack, agoraphobia).
 According to Davidson & Wilson (1973) the process of systematic
desensitization is not actually based on counterconditioning but on
extinction.
 Singh, A.K., Advanced clinical psychology, Motilal banarasidas publications(2012), p. 308-310 (6)