The present proposal details a psychosocial treatment outcome study for childhood phobias, that draws upon psychological theories of fear reduction. Specifically, the study is concerned with devising and evaluating the relative effectiveness of two psychosocial treatments, a self-control and a contingency management program, against an educational-support comparison group. The contingency management program involves reinforcement for approach behavior, shaping, extinction, and repeated practice, and instruction. The self-control condition focuses directly on the modification of faulty cognitions. The study also compares the relative effectiveness of these two programs for children of varying ages (8 to 11 versus 12 to 15), both in the short term and in the long term, through systematic follow-up procedures. The ultimate goal of the research is the development of a psychosocial treatment, i.e., either contingency management or a self-control program, that can be used by therapists for purposes of childhood fear reduction, which has been proven to be relatively efficacious in treating simple phobia, in children of specific ages.
| Silverman, W K; Eisen, A R (1992) Age differences in the reliability of parent and child reports of child anxious symptomatology using a structured interview. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 31:117-24 |
