Salter’s Conditioned Reflex Therapy: What It Is And How It Is Used
Broadly speaking, we can say that assertiveness is the ability to say “no” to requests or favors that we do not want to perform. This term was coined by J. Wolpe in 1958, although A. Salter had already used the concept in your conditioned reflex therapy
Salter’s conditioned reflex therapy is a model of assertive therapy, which seeks to promote the patient’s open expression, reducing inhibition and promoting action. The therapy focuses above all on enhancing the patient’s emotional expression. Let’s see what it consists of.
Assertiveness is a social skill that allows us defend one’s own rights, interests and ideas clearly and honestly without hurting or harming others.
One of the first authors who spoke about assertive training was A. Salter. In 1949 he published a book titled Conditioned Reflex Therapy, which talked about the negative effects of emotional conditioning and not being assertive. His work presented a model with different procedures to address assertiveness problems.
For A. Salter, assertiveness referred to a person’s ability to express their emotions (excitatory personality). The lack of assertiveness referred to inhibition or difficulty in expressing emotions (inhibitory personality).
However, although Salter was one of the first to talk about assertiveness, it was none other than J. Wolpe who coined the term, basing the concept on Salter’s work. Wolpe first used the term in his book Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition, in 1958.
To develop Salter’s conditioned reflex therapy, he used Pavlov’s contributions about conditioned reflexes and knowledge of the fundamental processes of higher nervous activity, that is, the processes of excitation and inhibition, as we have mentioned previously.
Thus, Salter relates mental disorders to inhibitory processes (inhibitory personality), and mental health to excitatory processes (excitatory personality).
The therapist’s role in Salter’s therapy is to promote in the patient the overcoming of their inhibitions We will ensure that you can freely express your own feelings. Many times patients have suffered excessive inhibitory conditioning that has caused them some suffering in previous stages of their lives. This occurred because such inhibition exceeded the person’s social requirements.
On the other hand, Salter’s conditioned reflex therapy focuses on two fundamental ideas:
1. Instruction offered to patients
This will be aimed at that patients act more and think less Salter (cited in Balarezo, 2003) points out in his work that “The healthy person acts without thinking and the sick person thinks without acting.”
2. Use of the 6 basic techniques in psychotherapy
These 6 techniques are as follows:
2.1. Externalization of feelings
The patient is intended to express their feelings and thoughts freely, without inhibitions.
2.2. Facial expression of feelings
The patient is trained to learn to identify and recognize your facial expressions and the relationship they have with emotions and their expression
23. Contradiction and attack when you disagree with the statements of others
It involves training the patient to express disagreement with the opinions or points of view of others. This can be done verbally and/or behaviorally.
2.4. Use of the word “I” deliberately in the greatest number of cases
The objective is that the patient uses pronouns and words that refer to himself (for example me, me, mine…), and do it more frequently than you currently do.
2.5. Acceptance and recognition of praise
It is about the patient being able to recognize the praise and accept it, and Do not use an attitude of false modesty when you are praised
2.6. Promote the ability to improvise
The patient will be trained so that he can improvise his behaviors and not plan them excessively, which can arise spontaneously when the situation requires it.
Other techniques used by Salter
In Salter’s conditioned reflex therapy, special emphasis is placed on the patient focusing their attention on the here and now, that is, Pay attention to your own behaviors, feelings and present thoughts
The therapeutic tasks used by Salter focused on facing problematic situations in (live) reality. It could be considered in some way a precursor to exhibition techniques. He also used relaxation techniques and pleasant images as tools to cope with and reduce anxiety, as well as to enhance appropriate or desired behaviors. These techniques could constitute the precedents for systematic desensitization.
