Two-year follow-up of systematic desensitization in therapy groups.

Abstract

The long-term effects of treatment for social-evaluative anxiety by modified systematic deserialization in time-limited intensive therapy groups were evaluated in a matched-groups design. 10 chronically anxious college males, treated by the group method, were reassessed on personality and anxiety scales that had previously shown significant improvement against an "own-control " period, and compared to 4 equated groups that had received individual programs of systematic desensitization, insight-oriented psychotherapy, attention-placebo treatment, or no-treatment. 10 no-treatment controls who were matched on all important variables provided a base line for evaluating extratreatment effects on academic performance as an objective, public criterion. 100 % return rates were obtained for all treated Ss, revealing maintenance of improvement found earlier for group desensitization, with additional improvement over the long-term follow-up period. No evidence of relapse or symptom substitution was obtained, although specifically sought. Group desensitization appears to provide an efficient and effective treatment for anxiety and is not limited to specific phobias. The introduction of group-treatment techniques has had a considerable impact on the fields of counseling and psychotherapy (Hunt, 1964). However, with a few notable exceptions (e.g., May & Tuma, 1964; Snyder & Sechrest, 1963), experimental evaluations of specific treatment innovations in groups have lagged even more than adequate assessment of individual psychotherapeutic outcome (Paul, 1966b). This state of affairs is further pronounced with respect to followup studies of the enduring effects of psychological treatment. Such studies are scarce (Fiske & Goodman, 1965), and the few published investigations of change or stability following treatment termination for noninstitutionalized adults treated for emotional problems have suffered considerable methodological

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