Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP)
Exposure Response Prevention (ERP) is a form of behavior therapy that entails purposeful exposure to thoughts, images, objects, and situations that evoke anxiety, obsessions and compulsions. The client is to practice interacting with their thoughts, feelings, environment differently in the presence of stimuli that typically evoke behaviors that continue the cycle of anxiety. The client needs to practice exposures many times in order to break the cycles that have been created through years of using avoidance techniques such as compulsions and obsessions that have only increased their anxiety over time.