Which is the goal of behavior therapy for a client with maladaptive behaviors?

By Catherine A. Sanderson, Amherst College

Psychotherapy is a structured interaction between a trained professional and a client with a problem, and a focus on assessing, diagnosing, and treating some type of abnormal behavior. By one count, including many minor variations, there are more than 400 different types of psychotherapy, representing a variety of views about the factors causing abnormal behavior and thoughts.

Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalysis

Sigmund Freud pioneered the oldest type of therapy, psychoanalysis, in the late 1890s. This controversial and largely superseded therapy ‘on the couch’ is based on the assumption that psychological problems are rooted in the repressed impulses and conflicts of childhood.

The goal of therapy is, therefore, to try to understand the unconscious and repressed motivations that are causing problematic thoughts, feelings, and behaviors so that the person can deal with them directly. And because the problems are assumed to be unconscious, the therapist uses techniques such as free association and dream interpretation, as ways to access otherwise repressed and unconscious wishes.

Influence of Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis was highly influential in moving therapy from asylums and mental hospitals toward office visits, and in pioneering what psychologists describe as ‘talk therapy’. There is also widespread agreement that childhood experiences can have lasting effects and that unconscious factors influence our thoughts, feelings, and behavior.

Psychoanalytic ideas were influential in the first two editions of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1952 and 1968. However, psychoanalysis has also been pretty widely criticized within the psychological community.

One concern is that traditional psychoanalysis is thought to require several years of therapy, typically involving several sessions a week. A lot of time is thought to be required for therapists to fully gain access and insight into the unconscious, which is only the first step in treating the symptoms or problems. This approach to therapy is therefore very time-consuming and expensive.

Psychodynamic Therapy

The so-called psychodynamic therapy is an offshoot that is typically shorter, in terms of both frequency and number of sessions. There’s also less focus on the patient-therapist relationship, and more attention to the patient’s other relationships.

But the main objection to psychoanalysis, and the scientific reason it declined in use in favor of other approaches, is that it is very difficult to test empirically. For example, psychoanalysts tend to believe that patients who resist a particular interpretation for their symptoms are showing additional signs of repression and that any resistance in fact suggests that the therapist’s interpretation is correct.

But this can set up an impossible paradox; if a therapist makes a suggestion, one can either agree with it—in which case the therapist is right, or one can disagree with it—in which case they are showing signs of resistance, proving that the therapist is right.

This article comes directly from content in the video series Introduction to Psychology. Watch it now, on Wondrium.

Alternative to Therapy: Behaviorism

An alternative approach to therapy, known as behaviorism, emerged in the early 1900s in part due to concerns about the inability of psychoanalytic theory to make predictions that could be tested experimentally. Behavior therapy is much more straight-forward in its approach. It is based in the assumption that problematic behaviors are learned, in the same way we learn any other behavior.

Changing behavior is, therefore, not about understanding the root causes of present-day problems, but rather just replacing maladaptive behaviors (and associated thoughts) with more constructive behaviors. How? By using techniques based on well-established principles of behavioral learning, going back to the classical conditioning of Pavlov and operant conditioning of Skinner.

Efficacy of Behavior Therapy

Behavior therapy approaches can be quite effective at changing people’s behavior in desired ways. But there are also some concerns about this approach to treating problems.

One concern is the repercussions when the reinforcement ends. Another broader concern is that behavior therapy’s focus on just treating a specific behavior may leave an underlying cause of their fear or behavior to show up in some other way.

Humanistic Psychotherapy

Humanistic psychology emerged during the 1940s as a reaction to the dominance of behaviorism and psychoanalysis. Humanist psychologists saw both of these perspectives as too pessimistic: psychoanalysis for focusing on the most negative emotions, and behaviorism for failing to take into account the role of individuals’ own choice and agency.

Rather than emphasizing dysfunction rooted in childhood or behavioral conditioning, the humanistic approach focuses on each person’s ability to fulfil their potential and maximize well-being. The therapist’s goal is therefore to help people feel better about themselves, learn new things, and experience psychological growth.

Cognitive Psychotherapy

Yet another reaction against psychoanalysis emerged in the 1950s, when Albert Ellis developed what is widely considered to be the first form of cognitive therapy.

His Rational-Emotive Therapy involved vigorously and critically challenging people’s illogical and self-defeating assumptions and attitudes. This approach is basically the exact opposite of the humanistic approach; instead of accepting and affirming the client’s view of the world, rational-emotive therapy focuses on revealing the client’s irrational and self-defeating views and replacing them with more rational and self-helping views.

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy

Beginning in the 1970s, the corrective approaches of both cognitive therapy and behavioral therapy were formally combined to create cognitive-behavioral therapy, or CBT. This approach views psychological disorders as rooted in maladaptive thoughts and feelings, which lead to problematic behaviors.

The therapist focuses on changing the underlying thoughts and feelings that lead to distress as well as modifying problematic behaviors that result from these beliefs.

Common Questions about the Different Types of Psychotherapy

Q: What is behaviorism in psychotherapy?

Behaviorismis based in the assumption that problematic behaviors are learned, in the same way we learn any other behavior. Changing behavior is, therefore, not about understanding the root causes of present-day problems, but rather just replacing maladaptive behaviors (and associated thoughts) with more constructive behaviors.

Q: What is cognitive-behavioral therapy?

Beginning in the 1970s, the corrective approaches of both cognitive therapy and behavioral therapy were formally combined to create cognitive-behavioral therapy, or CBT. This approach views psychological disorders as rooted in maladaptive thoughts and feelings, which lead to problematic behaviors.

Q: What is the humanistic approach to psychotherapy?

A humanistic approach to psychotherapy focuses on each person’s ability to fulfil their potential and maximize well-being. The therapist’s goal is therefore to help people feel better about themselves, learn new things, and experience psychological growth.

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