aversion therapy

what is aversion therapy?

a form of psychotherapy designed to cause a patient to reduce or avoid an undesirable behaviour pattern.

in contrast to miller what did smith et al find 1997 ?

alcoholics with aversion therapy had higher abstinence rates after one year than those who had counselling.

miller compared the effectiveness of what three type of treatment?

aversion therapy (shocks) counselling and aversion therapy counselling alone

how does aversion therapy work?

based on principles of classical conditioning. individual repeatedly presented with an averse stimulus like an electric shock at the same time there are engaging in the undesirable behaviour. the averse stimulus is UCS which produces a UCR such as avoidance.

who did a study of aversion therapy?

miller 1978

what did miller find one year later?

recovery was the same for all the groups. aversion therapy produced no benefit.

what are new developments to averse therapy?

researcher have discovered drugs that make users sick if they mix them with alcohol.

what is covert sensitisation?

using verbal suggestions instead of an actual stimulus. an example of this would be telling alcoholics to imagining frightening scenes while drinking.