Behavioural approach to explaining phobias

what is the two process model and who put it forward

Mowrer (1960)

Phobias are learnt by classical conditioning and maintained by operant conditioning

Classical Conditioning

who studied Little Albert

Watson and Rayner (1920)

How was little Albert conditioned

Whenever Albert played with a white rat, a loud noise was made

The noise caused a fear response

Rat did not create fear until bang and rat where paired together

Albert showed fear response every time he saw rat

Generalisation of fear to other stimuli

Litte Albert also showed a fear response to other white furry objects

e.g fur coat and Santa claus beard

How are phobias maintained

Operant conditioning (negative reinforcement)

Negative reinforcement in conditioning

When a person behaves in a way to avoid something upleasant

When a person with a phobia avoids a phobic stimulus they escape the anxiety they would have experienced

This reduction in fear negatively reinforces the avoidance behaviour and the phobia is maintained

Example of negative reinforcement (coulrophobia)

If someone has a fear of clowns they will avoid circuses and other situations where they may encounter clowns

The relief felt from avoiding clowns negatively reinforces the phobia and maintains it

One strength is real world application

The ideaof phobias eing maintained by avoidance helps explain why exposure therapy is beneficial

Itdentiifes a means of treating phobias

One limitation is the inability to explain cognitive aspects of phobias

two process model explains behaviour

However phobias also have a significant cognitive component e.g irrational beliefs about the phobic stimulus

This means the two process model doesn't fully explain the symptoms of phobia

Another strength is evidence linking phobias to bad experiences

De Jongh et al. found 73%of dentist phobics experienced a trauma

Further support came from the control group with low dental anxiety where only 21% had experienced a traumatic event

This confirms the association between stimulus (dentistry) and an unconditioned response (pain) leads to phobia

Counterpoint

Not all phobias appear after a bad experience

e.g. snake phobias occur in populations where very few people had any experience of snakes

Not all frightening experiences lead to phobias