The Reality of Individualism

Raevin Jimenez

My recent conversation with a friend had me rethink about how society views psychological diversity, both as its effects on the individual and its implications in society. He is a kind, sympathetic individual with an active curiosity and a desire to learn; however, he is not formally educated nor research oriented. He does love Oprah!
Oprah's program dealt with psychological "disorders," and specifically Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) which is common as a co-morbid and varies in intensity. The show had featured a credible psychologist in practice who uses the method developed by Foa and Kozak (1986) to treat people suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. The treatment is called Exposure Treatment which, in a nutshell, involves placing a patient in a safe and controlled environment where they are exposed to the source of their fear. It would be important to note that this research and development was geared toward subjects with phobias, not Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. A more severe method of Exposure Treatment is call Flooding, in which a patient is thrown into an environment where they are accosted by their fear, activating the fear response and remaining there until the fear response subsides. In some cases it does work, but it is far from the only way of treating phobias, and certainly of treating Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Certainly Foa and Kozak, and later Watson (1924) and Wolpe (1958) to name a few researchers who have significantly contributed to treating fear based disorders would be quick to advise any patient that there is no one best way to treat an individual because psychology varies in every single patient presenting with any kind of psychological condition.
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