Thought Stopping: A Useful Treatment in Phobias of ‘Internal Stimuli’

Abstract

Since Wolpe (1958) developed the idea of psychotherapy by reciprocal inhibition, systematic desensitization has emerged as an effective method of treatment in phobic states. There exists, however, a group of phobias which cannot be effectively treated with these techniques. These include fears of death, illness, harming other people, etc., and have been recognized by other authors as a separate group by themselves (Marks et al., 1969; Marks, 1969, 1970): phobias of internal stimuli. The search for a suitable method to treat these cases led us to use the thought stopping procedures described by Wolpe and Lazarus (1966, p. 132). There has been a notable lack of literature concerning this method, although Wolpe refers to J. A. Bain who used this technique in 1928.