Faculty Mentor
Charalambos Cleanthous
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2016
Department
Psychology
Abstract
The effectiveness of habit reversal training (HRT) and mild-aversion therapy were evaluated as a treatment package to reduce my chronic nail biting. This treatment package served to both decrease my nail biting behavior and extinguish it; however, I failed to include HRT’s element of competing response training within the treatment package. As a result, a set of other habitual problem behaviors, including nail, skin and face picking, replaced my nail biting behavior. A second experiment was conducted in which competing response training was included in the treatment package to decrease my nail, skin and face picking behaviors. As a result, the behaviors significantly decreased, my self-esteem and self-efficacy increased, and my fingernails grew 2 mm in length, on average, by the end of treatment. This suggests that mild-aversion therapy alone isn’t effective in treating habitual behaviors; however, habitual behaviors are best treated when competing response training is included within a treatment package using HRT.
Recommended Citation
Waterbury, Mary-Jo, "The Use of HRT and Mild-Aversion Therapy to Treat Habitual Behaviors" (2016). 2016 Symposium. 14.
https://dc.ewu.edu/srcw_2016/14
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
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