Paradigms Case

Paradigms

The paradigm that seemed to click the most for me was the cognitive-behavioral paradigm. This paradigm is basically describing that instead of being born with certain behaviors, you learn them through your environment and the people that are involved with your environment. You also learn them through classical and operant conditioning, modeling, and/or distinction or extinction. The aim of behavioral therapy is to identify the behaviors that are causing the problems and replace them with more appropriate ones. Some of the most commonly reported "abnormal problems" are withdrawal, avoidance of things, places, thoughts, feelings, etc., violence, suicide, and withholding food/vomiting.

I believe this paradigm stuck out to me and clicked with me the most because it made the most sense. I grew up hearing the saying 'monkey see, monkey do' and this paradigm fits that mold. When you're younger you want to be just like your mom/dad or older sibling so you do things just like them; you dress like them, start eating the foods they like and even start talking like them. This paradigm uses modeling as a treatment option and that is basically what modeling is; 'monkey see monkey do.' Modeling is more likely to work to help abolish abnormal behaviors if the observer and the model are similar.

I also really liked this paradigm because of the treatment options. I feel like classical conditioning, operant conditioning, modeling, distinction and/or extinction or a combination of a few could be a good way to change someone's abnormal behaviors. With operant conditioning you have positive and negative reinforcement and the reinforcement can be immediate, delayed, environmentally or self-controlled. There are also primary and secondary reinforces too. Primary reinforces are ones that aren't learned, or that are a part of our body's natural biology. Examples of some of these are food, water, shelter, safety, etc. Secondary reinforces are ones that are learned, for example, money, social acceptance, status, etc.

Another thing about this paradigm that I think made a lot of sense was that in the treatment, since it is a behavioral therapy, they focused on changing what you know. Since what you know is obviously causing you to have abnormal problems and cause you to have abnormal behaviors, by changing your everyday behaviors they can break the habit possibly and help ease the abnormalities.

Paradigms are beneficial in general because they help us determine which behaviors are 'disordered', how to assess for the presence of the disorder, and the proposed treatment for that disorder. It also has significant research support.

A good example of where behavioral therapy could be beneficial to someone would be a rape victim who is trying to get involved in an intimate relationship. Operant conditioning would be