A therapeutic counseling practice that employs positive and negative reinforcements to encourage patients to voluntarily change or eliminate problematic behaviors that accompany, among others, anxiety, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism, obsessive-compulsive disorder and substance abuse or addiction.
Behavioral modification therapy’s development generally is traced back to 1911 when psychologist Edward Thorndike published “Provisional Laws of Acquired Behavior or Learning,” an articled based on his initial analysis of animal behavior. (Psychologist B.F. Skinner’s work on behavior conditioning was based on Thorndike’s “law of effect” linking stimuli to responses.) Behavior modification came into fuller use in the 1940s and 1950s, and the field particularly began to flourish in the 1970s.
Several tenets shape this rewards-and punishments-based practice to help patients develop positive behaviors. Among them are these: 1) Antecedents, which existed before the problematic or disagreeable behavior. 2) Consequences. 4) Response costs. 5) Avoidance. 6) Fear reduction. 7) Extinction.
Types of behavior modification therapy include flooding therapy, which uses fear-inducing techniques; aversion therapy, which associates something unpleasant or repulsive with problematic behavior; and systematic desensitization, which aims to lessen severe phobia by conditioning patients to receive stimuli that yields a relaxation response.