The Behavioural Model of Abnormality says Behaviours are all learnt:

Behaviourists argue that phobias are learnt in the same way that all behaviours are learnt- through classical and operant conditioning

Classical Conditioning:

1. In classical conditioning, a natural reflex is produced in response to a previously neutral stimulus- phobias can be created when the natural fear response becomes associated with a particular stimulus

2. Phobias can generalise to similar stimuli. For example, Watson and Rayner (1920) conditioned a phobia in Little Albert using the method above. Albert’s resulting phobia of white rats was generalised to fluffy white objects

Operant Conditioning:

1. Operant conditioning is learning from the consequences of actions. Actions which have a good outcome through positive reinforcement (reward) or negative reinforcement (removal of something bad) will be repeated. Actions which have a bad outcome (punishment) will not be repeated

2. Operant conditioning is important in maintaining phobias

The Two-Process Model explains how phobias are produced and Maintained:

Mowrer’s two-process model (1947) explains how classical and operant conditioning produce and maintain phobias

1. People develop phobias (usually specific phobias) by classical conditioning- a CS (conditioned stimulus) is paired with a UCS (unconditioned stimulus) to produce the CR (conditioned response)

2. Once somebody has to developed a phobia, it’s maintained through operant conditioning- people get anxious around the phobic stimulus and avoid it. This prevents the anxiety, which acts as negative reinforcement

Operant conditioning can also explain how social phobia and agoraphobia develop from a specific phobia- people are anxious that they’ll experience a panic attack in a social situation or an open place (because of their specific phobia), so they avoid these situations

The behaviour explanation of phobias has strengths and weaknesses:

Strengths:

1. Barlow and Durand (1995) showed that in cases of individuals with a severe fear of driving. 50% of them had actually been involved in a road accident. Through classical conditioning, the road accident (a UCS) had turned driving into a CS for those now with the phobia

2. Behavioural therapies are very effective at treating phobias by getting the person to change their response to the stimulus. This suggests that they treat the cause of the problem

Weaknesses:

1. Davey (1992) found that only 7% of spider phobic recalled having a traumatic experience with a spider

2. This suggests that there could be other explanations, e.g. biological factors. (Just because they couldn’t remember the experience, this doesn’t mean it didn’t happen)

Phobias can be treated using behavioural therapies:

Behavioural treatment for phobias is based on classical conditioning- there are two techniques:

Systematic desensitization:

1. Systematic desensitisation works by using counter-conditioning so that the person learns to associate the phobic stimulus with relaxation rather than fear

2. First, the phobic person makes a ‘fear hierarchy’. This is a list of feared events, showing what they fear least (e.g. seeing a picture of a spider) through to their most feared event (e.g. holding a spider)

3. They are then taught relaxation techniques like deep breathing

4. The patient then imagines the anxiety-provoking situations, starting with the least stressful, They’re encouraged to use relaxation techniques and the process stops if they feel anxious

5. Relaxation and anxiety can’t happen at the same time, so when they become relaxed and calm, they’re no longer scared. This is repeated until the feared event is only linked with relaxation

6. This whole process is repeated for each stage of the fear hierarchy until they are calm through their most feared event

Flooding:

1. This involves exposing the patient to the phobic stimulus straight away, without any relaxation or gradual build-up. This can be done in real life, or the patient can be asked to visualise it. For example, someone who is afraid of heights might imagine standing on top of a skyscraper

2. The patient is kept in this situation until the anxiety they feel at first has worn off. They realise that nothing bad has happened to them in this time, and their fear should be extinguished

Advantages:

• Behavioural therapy is very effective for treating specific phobias. Zinbarg et al (1992) found that systematic desensitisation was the most effective of the currently known methods for treating phobias

• It works very quickly, e.g. Ost et al (1991) found that anxiety was reduced in 90% of patients with a specific phobia after just one session of therapy

Disadvantages:

• There are ethical issues surrounding behavioural therapy- especially flooding, as it causes patients a lot of anxiety. If patients drop out of the therapy before the fear has been extinguished, then it can end up causing more anxiety than before the therapy started

• Behavioural therapy only treats the symptoms of the disorder. Other therapies try to tackle the cause of it, e.g. cognitive behaviour therapy