Systematic desensitization

Systematic desensitization is a behavioral treatment that pairs gradual exposure to feared cues with relaxation training, aiming to weaken learned fear responses.

Reciprocal inhibition: A proposed process in which one response suppresses another incompatible response. Joseph Wolpe used this idea to explain how relaxation could inhibit fear during exposure.
Joseph Wolpe: A South African psychiatrist who developed systematic desensitization as a treatment for anxiety. Wolpe formulated the procedure and popularized reciprocal inhibition as its rationale.
Specific phobia: An anxiety disorder marked by intense, persistent fear of a particular object or situation. Graded desensitization was developed especially for circumscribed fears and phobias.
Flooding (psychology): An exposure method that confronts a person with a highly feared cue without gradual progression. Flooding contrasts with systematic desensitization’s stepwise movement through a fear hierarchy.
Fear hierarchy: An ordered list of feared situations ranked by the distress they are expected to cause. Treatment typically advances through this graded list rather than confronting the strongest fear first.
Mary Cover Jones: An American psychologist whose early work used gradual exposure and positive associations to reduce a child’s fear. Her treatment of Peter anticipated principles later formalized in systematic desensitization.
In vivo exposure: Exposure to feared situations or objects in real life. A fear hierarchy can be practiced directly with real-world cues.
Applied relaxation: A treatment that teaches rapid relaxation for use at the onset of anxiety. Unlike systematic desensitization, it does not depend on pairing relaxation with graded feared cues.
Relaxation training: Techniques that teach deliberate reduction of physical and mental tension. Relaxation is trained before exposure and used as the competing response to anxiety.
Behavior therapy: Psychological treatment that applies learning principles to change observable behavior and emotional responses. Systematic desensitization emerged within behavior therapy’s effort to treat fear through learning.

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