Follow-up results of a behaviorally based treatment program for agoraphobia

Includes bibliographical references (pages 50-55)This study was designed to examine long term treatment effects\ud for agoraphobic individuals completing a multimodal, behaviorally\ud based treatment program called Terrap. Self-report measures collected\ud from 39 previous identified agoraphoibc individuals prior to\ud treatment, at the onset of treatment, at the end of treatment, and\ud at nine to fourteen months following completion of treatment were\ud used as dependent measures. The initial pre-treatment wainting\ud period served as a control period and showed no essential changes.\ud The battery of dependent measures was comprised of anxiety scales,\ud internal-external locus of control, self-evalutaions of functioning,\ud and opinions about source of change effects. In addition to studying\ud main effects, the population was subdivided into most and least\ud improved subjects based on the overall degree in improvement at the one year follow-up evaluation. Results revealed that treatment was successful at reducing the intensity of symptoms and avoidance behavior, as well as increasing levels of comfort in a variety of typical\ud agorapmbic problem areas. These main effects were maintained\ud and/or improved at follow-up, validating the Terrap Self-Help Program\ud as an effective treatment for agoraphobia. Meaningful differences\ud between most improved and least improved groups were discussed