Behaviour Therapy

Behaviour therapy or behavior therapy is an approach to psychotherapy in the behaviourism tradition that focuses on a set of methods designed for reinforcing desired and eliminating undesired behaviors without concerning itself with the psychoanalytic state of the subject. In its broadest sense the methods focus on behaviors, not the thoughts and feelings that might be causing them. Behavior therapy breaks down into two disciplines, a more narrowly defined sense of behavior therapy and behavior modification. Within the psychological theories of learning and conditioning, behavior therapy generally treats psychopathology with Pavlovian or respondent conditioning, while behavior modification makes use of operant or instrumental conditioning. These distinctions are not absolute with some crossover occurring in practice.