Behavioral Treatment of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorders: Current Status

Behavioral treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorders ranks among the most widely used and widely studied approaches to these problems. Next to sociopathy these disorders have traditionally been regarded as constituting one of the most difficult classes of psychological problems to treat; certainly they present an exceptionally low rate of success. By contrast with the usual insight psychotherapy, behavior therapy usually focuses on the symptoms alone, with little attention to any underlying intrapsychic or environmental conditions that presumably maintain the symptom. Behavior therapy ignores, in short, the total personality or lifestyle. This symptom specificity of treatment has rendered behavioral approaches subject to criticism from practitioners of more traditional approaches. In more recent years, newer techniques and strategies of behavior therapy have rendered some of those criticisms obsolete. A trend toward consideration of other symptoms and the individual's environment has also been noted.