Methods Of Modifying Behaviour 2: Aversion Therapy Flashcards
What is aversion therapy based off of?
The princples of classical conditioning, a key assumption of the behaviourist approach. The Unconditioned stimulus produces an Unconditioned response. When the Unconditioned stimulus is paired with a neutral stimulus (addictive behaviour) and a conditioned response is learned. The behaviour is now associated with the conditioned response
What are the two types of aversion therapy we consider?
Antabuse and Rapid Smoking
How is Antabuse used to treat alcholism?
Individuals can be given a drug called Antabuse to act as the adverse stimulus. Antabuse works by affecting how the body metabolises alcohol. Antabuse disrupts the usual process of breaking down alcohol, the is known as the disulfiram reaction, which stops the enzyme from working and causes a build up of actelahyde in the blood stream
How does the body normally break down alcohol? (Antabuse path)
Alcohol is broken down to the compound called acetaldehyde and then futher broken down by an enzyme in the liver called acetaldehyde dehydrogenase
What does a build-up in acetaldehyde cause?
Unpleasant symptoms such as sweating, heart palpitations headaches and vomiting . Which occur within 10 minutes of consuming alcohol and can last a few hours
What does the negative association caused by the disulfiram effect result in? (Antabuse)
The patient will start avoiding contact with behaviour and may also avoid triggers associated with it such as pubs
What are the NICE guidelines for antabuse treament?
Antabuse should be used after withdrawal has taken place. They are given 200mg daily but it can be increased if the reaction with alcohol isn’t adverse enough. They stay under supervision every 2 weeks for 2 months then monthy for 4 months. People taking it need to be careful from alcohol from other sources e.g mouthwash
How is Rapid smoking used?
It’s a form of aversion therapy used to help smokers overcome their addiction. Smokers sit in a closed room and take a puff on a cigarette or feel sick. In this case the unconditioned stimulus is feeling sick.
What is the hope behind rapid smoking?
Patients gain an aversion to smoking and avoid it
What are the 3 evaulation point for effectiveness of Aversion therapy?
Effectiveness of antabuse
Effectiveness of rapid smoking
Eliminates the behaviour not the problem
Explain the effectiveness of Antabuse (evaulation)
Research compared antabuse to placebo and assessed their participants using self-report methods and screening for 90 days
Antabuse patients had significantly greater abstinence duration than the placebo group, further research found that antabuse resulted in fewer drinking days and more days until relapse
Explain the effectiveness of rapid smoking (evaulation)
Research carried out on 100 smokers attending a cessation clinic, where rapid smoking was compared to a control condition of watching a video about giving up smoking. The rapid smoking group showed a sig decrease in their desire to smoke in the 24 hours and a week after the procedure. But after 4 weeks the desire was the same.
Explain the eliminates the behaviour not the problem (evaluation)
Aversion therapy doesn’t remove the addiction, but instead it creates an aversion to a specific behaviour. If there is an underlying issue, e.g cognitive bias, then it won’t be addressed and the individual may switch their focus to another behaviour
What are the two ethical implications of Aversion therapy?
Risk of harm
More ethical alternatives
What are the two social implications of Aversion therapy?
Financial implications
The social cost of not treating addictions
Explain the risk of harm associated with Aversion therapy (evaluation: ethical implications)
Taking Antabuse can clearly cause very negative effects on an individual. Rapid smoking is also very unpleasant, however, valid consent is gained by ppt
Explain the more ethical alternatives to Aversion therapy (evaluation: ethical implications)
Covert sentisation is when an invidual is encourage to imagine vomiting when the urge to drink. Research has shown its a very quick and effective treatment, much more ethical than physical vomiting
Explain the financial implications of Aversion therapy (evaulation: social implications)
Research highlights the dramatic increase, in 2008 £2.25 million was spent on the medication up from £1.08 million in 1998
Explain the social cost of not treating addictions (Evalutation: social implications)
The No Quick Fix report highlights the social cost of addiction, stating alcohol abuse cost the tax payer £21 billion. As unemployment leads to less tax, more benefits etc
Alcoholism costs the NHS £3.5 billion
