Twelve-month follow-up of virtual reality and standard exposure therapies for the fear of flying.
This study reports the 12-month follow-up from patients with the fear of flying who were treated in a controlled study and randomly assigned (n = 49) to virtual reality exposure (VRE) therapy, standard exposure (SE) therapy, or to a wait-list control (WL). VRE and SE were equally superior to WL. At 12 months posttreatment, data were gathered on 24 of the 30 (80%) patients who were assigned to VRE or SE. Patients maintained their treatment gains, and 92% of VRE participants and 91% of SE participants had flown on a real airplane since the graduation flight. This is the 1st year-long follow-up of patients having been treated with VRE and indicates that short-term treatment can have lasting effects.
Rothbaum
Barbara Olasov
BO
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia 30322, USA. brothba@emory.edu
Hodges
Larry
L
Anderson
Page L
PL
Price
Larry
L
Smith
Samantha
S
D000328:Adult; D000401:Aircraft; D003887:Desensitization, Psychologic / Q000379:methods*; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011614:Psychotherapy, Brief; D013813:Therapy, Computer-Assisted; D014195:Travel; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014584:User-Computer Interface