Introduction
Aversion therapy is a type of psychological intervention in which the patient is exposed to a stimulus while at the same time being subjected to some form of discomfort. This conditioning is used so as to cause the patient to relate the stimulus with unpleasant sensations in order to discontinue the specific behavior. It can be done in many forms like placing an unpleasant substance on the fingernails to discontinue nail –chewing, using an emetic so that to stop the experience of alcohol or it can be done by pairing behavior with electric shocks of various intensities.
. It is majorly used in the treatment of addiction to alcohol and other drugs. Since 1932, this type of intervention has been in continuous operation. American society of addiction medicine published a treatment plan which was discussed in the principle of addiction medicine, chapter 8 in 2003. It is also used in the self-help group community in order to treat minor behavioral issues with the aid of an elastic band, while thinking an undesirable behavior/ thought the patient or user will snap the elastic band.
Traditional aversion therapy included either chemical aversion or electrical aversion was used till 1967, then it was replaced by aversion in the imagination, it is a technique which is known as covert sensitization. …show more content…
In a research it was found that covert desensitization was effective in each case. Every single participant eradicated their undesirable behavior and this effect held in a longitudinal follow up. Opposite to this Okulitch and Marlatt found out that unit of 30 alcoholics and 30 social drinker subjected to aversion therapy through shock treatment did much worse than the untreated control group at the 15 month follow up