Phobias (Behavioural Approach)

Panic (Emotional)

High levels of stress and anxiety (Behaviour)

Out of proportion fear (Emotional)

Beliefs which are irrational (Cognitive)

Irrational Fear (Emotional)

Avoidance (Behaviour)

Selective attention (Cognition)

The Two-Process Model:

1. Classical Conditioning (Initiation) - Little Albert Study: Phobia is aquired through association. Neural stimulus (rat) + unconditioned stimulus (loud noise) = unconditioned response (fear) = conditioned response (fear of loud noise paired with rat) = conditioned stimulus (is now the rat)

2. Operant Conditioning (Maintenance) - CC doesn't explain why one continues to fear something or avoid it. A behaviour is likely to be repearted if the outcome is rewarding. Avoiding something your phobic stimulus reduces the fear so is reinforcing (negative reinforcement)

Social Learning: Neo-behaviourist explanation (fear seems reduced). Phobias may be aquired through modelling the behaviour of others 

Diathesis-stress model: Suggests we inherit as genetic vunerabilty for developing mental disorders that will only occur if triggered by a certain event

Support for social learning: Bandura and Roesnthal support it. Experiment - model acted as if he was in pain everytime a buzzer sounded. Later on those who had observed it showed an emotional reaction to the buzzer = showed a fear response

Biological preparedness: Seligman argued that humans are genetically programmed to learn an association between potentially life-threatening stimuli and fear - known as ancient fears (things that would have been dangerous in the past).

The two-process model ignores cognitive factors: Cognitive approach suggests that phobias may develop due to irrational thinking - this is helpful as it can lead tocognitive therapies such as CBT being developed