The Use of Psychotherapy and Behavior Therapy in the Treatment of an Obsessional Disorder

Abstract

Behavior therapists are much more oriented toward an ongoing and systematic measurement of change in target behaviors or symptoms than are dynamic therapists. The latter, focusing upon underlying conflicts, are more apt to view change as a more slowly evolving and global phenomenon. This case study is of a patient hospitalized for depression and obsessional thoughts, and treated by sequential and concurrent behavioral therapy and psychotherapy. The former included “thought stopping” and “assertion training,” while the latter included group therapy, insight-oriented psychotherapy, and “attribution therapy.” This aspect of the therapy was primarily organized around helping the patient to understand his symptoms as a response to anxiety arising from stress in daily life. No mention was made of systematic attempts to relate the stress to the presence of unconscious dynamic conflicts.