How Do You Work With The Phobia Of Flying In Psychotherapy?
The phobia of flying is one of the most common specific phobias, but fortunately, it responds very well to psychological treatment.
In this article We will see what the process of working in psychotherapy with patients with a phobia of flying consists in broad strokes.taking into account that the treatment is always personalized and varies depending on the needs of each person.
The phobia of flying It is a type of specific phobia, a category of psychopathologies that in turn is included in anxiety disorders.. Therefore, it will be defined with the same criteria as these psychological alterations and similar treatments adapted to the specific type of phobia will be used.
The characteristic feature or criterion of any specific phobia is the disproportionate fear or anxiety that appears when faced with a stimulus, generating great discomfort and the need to avoid it. Thus, the phobia of flying will involve a very intense fear of the situation of flying that will affect the patient’s functionality, that is, it will have a negative impact on different areas of their life too frequently.
How are cases of people suffering from this phobia detected?
The diagnosis of specific phobia can only be carried out by mental health professionals.; Thus, before the work carried out in therapy, there is a phase of recognition of the symptoms and identification of the underlying psychopathology.
The fifth edition of the diagnostic manual of the American Psychological Association (DSM 5) indicates that a series of criteria must be met in order to diagnose specific phobia. The first defining criterion indicates that the phobia is related to an intense fear or anxiety about a specific object or situation, such as being inside an airplane; The second criterion that must be met is that the phobic object or situation almost always causes immediate fear or anxiety, that is, it is presented just at the moment the stimulus appears.
Likewise, another criterion that every phobia also meets is that the anxiety is disproportionate to the real danger that generates the specific object or situation (in the case of the phobia of flying, the aircraft used today are very safe); The fourth point is the tendency to avoid the phobic object or situation, or the fact that if it is endured it is with great discomfort.
The following criterion highlights that fear, anxiety or avoidance causes discomfort and dysfunction in the quality of life in important areas of daily life, such as social and work life.
Finally, it is necessary that this pattern of fear, anxiety and avoidance lasts a minimum of 6 months.
It is also necessary make a differential diagnosis and verify that anxiety is not better explained by another psychological disorder such as panic disorder, agoraphobia, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, separation anxiety or social anxiety, among others.
In this way, knowing the main characteristics that specific phobias must meet, it can be said that the phobia of flying meets the defining criteria of the phobia of a specific stimulus caused by the experience or expectation of flying in airplanes, helicopters, etc.
Within the types of specific phobia, the one that makes its symptoms emerge in the situation of flying in an aircraft is classified within the category of situational phobia; That is, anxiety and fear appear in specific situations, with this type of phobia normally occurring later in the age group between 13 and 22 years old.
What is done about the phobia of flying in psychotherapy?
In order to treat specific phobias, different treatments of varying effectiveness have been used, and specific and concrete interventions have also been designed to confront and manage the symptoms of flying phobia.
The techniques that have been shown to be most useful and effective for any phobia are behavioral and cognitive; In particular, it will be essential to carry out exposure exercises to the phobic stimulus in order to overcome and confront the anxiety that comes with it.
This involves, among other things, making the person “expose” themselves to the phobic stimulus gradually and going from the easiest to the most difficult, resisting the urge to withdraw and avoid these types of experiences. To do this, you can work with imagination exercises (previous training in the ability to imagine vividly), with virtual reality resources that offer simulations of the interior of an airplane, or using real aircraft.
Likewise, components and forms of treatment specifically adapted to the phobia of flying will be used. Thus, for flying phobia, a type of treatment program has been used that includes the following elements.
1. Psychoeducation
Firstly, a psychoeducation phase is carried out, which aims to inform the patient about the nature of the disorder that has developedhelping you get rid of preconceived ideas and erroneous beliefs that could hinder your improvement in your quality of life.
The patient is explained what they consist of and how they affect phobias and anxiety, so that they better understand what is happening to them, and they are also given information about airplanes and how they work, referring to their safety and the probability of that an accident occurs by comparing it with other means of transportation.
2. Intervention on cognitive processes
Another component used focuses on treating possible cognitive alterations that may occur in the patient, that is, the irrational or untrue beliefs that the subject may present.
To this end, we will use the cognitive restructuring technique, which consists of identifying those irrational or negative beliefs related to airplanes and the act of getting on one that arise in the patient, and that generate great emotional discomfort and frustration.
This process consists of raise questions and present topics that allow these harmful ideas to be confronted and changed, letting the patient himself question his beliefs once he has been presented with certain information or made to combine two or more concepts. This is an intervention inspired by the Socratic method.
Next, we proceed with teaching controlled breathing and/or relaxation techniques. This helps the subject to control their breathing by relaxing the abdominal muscles, contracting the diaphragm and relaxing the intercostal muscles.
Through the conscious control of certain processes linked to the physiological aspect of the individual, It helps you let the state of anxiety fade awaysince this is associated with a state of nervous and muscular hyper-activation.
Related article: “6 easy relaxation techniques to combat stress”
4. Exposure exercises
As we have seen, in psychotherapy applied to cases of phobia of flying it is necessary for the person to learn to face their fear without constantly giving in “to what the body asks of them” when the phobic stimulus appears, so they must give up avoid or flee from these experiences. To facilitate this process, exposure techniques used in psychotherapy have been developed, which are intended so that the patient does not become frustrated or increase his fear by failing time after time when trying to overcome anxiety.
To do this, psychologists give a series of indications on how to manage anxiety (related to provisionally accepting a certain level of discomfort without trying to eliminate it completely and keep it “away from the mind”) and with an ascending difficulty curve adapted to the degree. in which the person is able to resist the phobic stimulus in each phase of therapy.
For example, You can start with an exposure in imagination, that is, without the real phobic stimulus (we can use both a computer program and virtual reality, or imagination exercises) to then move on to real stimuli.
