Skip to main content

Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It's Only A False Alarm: Therapist Guide

Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm comes in two volumes. This page is for the Therapist Guide. Click on the following link to access the Client Workbook. An estimated 1 – 2% of children experience obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), including Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), is an effective treatment for OCD. It is recommended by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). The Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm guide is written by John Piacentini, Audra Langley, Tami Roblek, and provides therapists with all the tools they need to deliver effective, evidence-based psychological treatment for OCD in children aged 8 – 17. Part of the Treatments That Work series, the program consists of individual exposure plus response prevention (ERP) for the client, and a CBT family intervention for parents and siblings conducted concurrently.

Download or send

Choose your language

Introduction

Chapter 1: Session 1: Psychoeducation and Rationale

Chapter 2: Session 2: Creating a Symptom Hierarchy / Psychoeducation

Chapter 3: Session 3: Beginning ERP / Challenging Negative Assumptions

Chapter 4: Session 4: Cognitive Restructuring / Blame Reduction

Chapter 5: Session 5: Dealing with Obsessions / Family Responses to OCD

Chapter 6: Session 6: Reviewing Progress / Child’s Responsibility for Treatment

Chapter 7: Session 7: Troubleshooting Obstacles to ERP / Secondary Gain

Chapter 8: Session 8: Continuing ERP / Differentiating OCD vs Non-OCD Behaviors

Chapter 9: Session 9: Addressing More Difficult Symptoms / Family Self-Care

Chapter 10: Session 10: Addressing More Difficult Symptoms / Family Problem Solving Prevention

Chapter 11: Session 11: Planning for Termination / Relapse Prevention

Chapter 12: Session 12: Graduation

Appendix

Front Matter

References

Tags

Languages this resource is available in

  • English (GB)
  • English (US)

Problems this resource might be used to address

Techniques associated with this resource

Mechanisms associated with this resource

Introduction & Theoretical Background

An estimated 1 – 2% of children experience OCD, Rapoport et al, 2000). Symptoms include obsessions (repetitive and distressing thoughts, images, or urges) and compulsions (repetitive behaviors, including mental acts, that are performed in response to obsessions). Obsessions and compulsive are often time consuming and can have a significant impact on people’s relationships, work, and ability to function. Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm is a comprehensive program which assists clinicians in delivering an effective program of ERP for OCD. The program includes two books:

  • Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm: Therapist Guide details the step-by-step treatment of OCD using ERP, including common obstacles.
  • Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm: Workbook is the companion to this therapist guide. It will help your patients to become active participants in their treatment and learn how to implement ERP, both independently and with the support of a therapist.

About Treatments That Work®

Authored by leading psychologists including David Barlow, Michelle Craske and Edna Foa, Treatments That Work® is a series of manuals and workbooks based on the principles of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). Each pair of books (therapist guide and workbook) – contains step-by-step procedures for delivering evidence-based psychological interventions and will help you to provide the best possible care for your clients. At Psychology Tools, we are proud to make many of the Treatments That Work® titles available to our members. Each book is available to download chapter-by-chapter, and Psychology Tools members with a currently active subscription to our ‘Complete’ plan are licensed to share copies with their clients.

How effective is this treatment?

Addressing OCD using ERP is seen as one of greatest success stories in the field of mental health, and has led to dramatic improvements in how OCD is understood and treated (Abramowitz, 2006). Over the last 40 years, a substantial body of evidence supporting the use of ERP for treating OCD has accumulated. It is recommended in clinical practice guidelines for treating depression developed by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), which produce guidelines for the National Health Service in the United Kingdom (APA, 2007; NICE, 2005). Evidence for this approach is impressive. A recent, comprehensive review of studies identified ERP-based CBT as being an effective treatment for OCD, and more effective than other forms of therapy (Ferrando & Selai, 2021). The program described in Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm was initially developed and tested at the New York State Psychiatric Institute / Columbia University, and then refined and tested at the Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). The current program was derived from a treatment manual developed for use in a NIMH-funded treatment study.

Chapters in Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm: Therapist Guide: 

  • Chapter 1: Session 1: Psychoeducation and Rationale
  • Chapter 2: Session 2: Creating a Symptom Hierarchy / Psychoeducation
  • Chapter 3: Session 3: Beginning ERP / Challenging Negative Assumptions
  • Chapter 4: Session 4: Cognitive Restructuring / Blame Reduction
  • Chapter 5: Session 5: Dealing with Obsessions / Family Responses to OCD
  • Chapter 6: Session 6: Reviewing Progress / Child’s Responsibility for Treatment
  • Chapter 7: Session 7: Troubleshooting Obstacles to ERP / Secondary Gain
  • Chapter 8: Session 8: Continuing ERP / Differentiating OCD vs Non-OCD Behaviors
  • Chapter 9: Session 9: Addressing More Difficult Symptoms / Family Self-Care
  • Chapter 10: Session 10: Addressing More Difficult Symptoms / Family Problem Solving Prevention
  • Chapter 11: Session 11: Planning for Termination / Relapse Prevention
  • Chapter 12: Session 12: Graduation
  • Appendix: Rating Scales
  • References
  • About the Authors

About the authors

John Piacentini, PhD, ABPP, is Professor of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences; Director of the Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program; and Chief of Child Psychology in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. He received his PhD in clinical psychology from the University of Georgia and completed postdoctoral training at the New York State Psychiatric Institute/Columbia University, where he spent the next seven years as a faculty member in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. Dr. Piacentini moved to UCLA in 1995 and founded the UCLA Child OCD program shortly thereafter. He is an active CBT teacher and supervisor at UCLA, and has conducted numerous CBT workshops for OCD and related disorders both in the United States and around the world. He has published extensively on the treatment of childhood OCD, anxiety, and tic disorders, and has received several grants from the National Institutes of Health and other groups to study treatments for these and related disorders. Dr. Piacentini is a member of the American Board of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology and is board certified in this discipline, a founding fellow of the Academy of Cognitive Therapy, and chair of the Behavioral Sciences Consortium of the Tourette Syndrome Association.

Audra Langley, PhD, is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience, where she works within the UCLA Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program. Dr. Langley is also the Director of Training for the LAUSD/UCLA/RAND Trauma Services Adaptation Center as part of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network. She is a researcher and clinician who specialises in cognitive-behavioural treatment for youth with anxiety disorders. After receiving her PhD in Clinical Child Psychology from Virginia Tech, she went on to specialize in CBT with children and adolescents during her internship at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute. She was the recipient of an NIMH-funded National Research Service Award to further her postdoctoral research training in the clinical evaluation of evidence-based treatments for anxiety disorders. Dr. Langley has served as investigator, trainer, clinician, and clinical supervisor on several clinic and school-based studies and trials treating children and adolescents with posttraumatic stress, OCD, anxiety, and tic disorders, and has presented and published research papers on her work.

Tami Roblek, PhD, received her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Louisville and completed her internship at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute, where she specialised in child and adolescent anxiety disorders. For her postdoctoral training, she was the recipient of an NIMH-funded National Research Service Award focused on family environmental factors associated with OCD. In her current role as a clinician and researcher within the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, she works within the UCLA Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program providing assessments and cognitive-behavioral treatment to youth with anxiety and tic disorders. Dr. Roblek has presented and published articles on childhood anxiety, OCD, school refusal, and trichotillomania in youth.

Therapist Guidance

Each Treatments That Work® title is published in two volumes:
  • Clients use the Workbooks, which contain elements of psychoeducation, skills development, self-assessment quizzes, homework exercises, and record forms.
  • Therapists use the Therapist Guides, which contain step-by-step instructions for teaching clients’ skills, overcoming common difficulties.
Although written for the client, the exercises in the workbook are intended to be carried out under the supervision of a mental health professional. The authors suggest that the most effective implementation of these exercises requires an understanding of the principles underlying the different procedures, and that mental health professionals should be familiar with the Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Of Childhood OCD: It’s Only A False Alarm: Workbook, as well as this therapist guide. Therapists with an active subscription to a Psychology Tools ‘Complete’ plan are licensed to use Treatments That Work® titles, and to download and share chapters with their clients.

References And Further Reading

  • Abramowitz, J. S. (2006). The psychological treatment of obsessive—compulsive disorder. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 51, 407-416. DOI: 1177/070674370605100702.
  • American Psychiatric Association (2007). Practice guideline for the treatment of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder. https://psychiatryonline.org/pb/assets/raw/sitewide/practice_guidelines/guidelines/ocd.pdf.
  • Fawcett, E. J., Power, H., & Fawcett, J. M. (2020). Women are at greater risk of OCD than men: a meta-analytic review of OCD prevalence worldwide. The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 81, 19r13085. Doi:10.4088/JCP.19r13085.
  • Ferrando, C., & Selai, C. (2021). A systematic review and meta-analysis on the effectiveness of exposure and response prevention therapy in the treatment of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. Journal of Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders, 31, 100684. DOI: 1016/j.jocrd.2021.100684.
  • Mathers, C. D., & Loncar, D. (2006). Projections of global mortality and burden of disease from 2002 to 2030. PLoS Medicine, 3, e442. Doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.0030442
  • National Institute for Clinical Excellence (2005). Obsessive-compulsive disorder: Core interventions in the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder and body dysmorphic disorder (Clinical guideline CG31). https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg31.
  • Rapoport, J., Inoff–Germain, G., Weissman, M. M., Greenwald, S., Narrow, W. E., Jensen, P. S., Lahey, B. B., & Canino, G. (2000). Childhood obsessive-compulsive disorder in the NIMH MECA Study: Parent versus child identification of cases. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 14, 535-548.