How To Stop Skin Picking and Hair Pulling In 4 Steps

Tracy Marks, a psychiatrist, discusses compulsive behaviors like hair pulling and skin picking, and introduces habit reversal training as an effective therapy. The training involves three phases: awareness training, competing response training, and motivation and support. An additional technique, stimulus control, helps reduce environmental triggers. The video provides detailed steps for each phase, emphasizing the importance of journaling and support systems. Marks also offers a downloadable handout summarizing the process.

What is the primary goal of habit reversal training?

• To ignore the habits and hope they go away

• To replace negative habits with positive ones

• To eliminate all habits completely

• To use medication to control habits

Which of the following is NOT a step in Awareness Training?

• Identifying the habit

• Recognizing triggers

• Ignoring the behavior

• Identifying early warning signs

What is the purpose of Competing Response Training?

• To keep the hands still

• To eliminate the need for a support person

• To increase the frequency of the old behavior

• To substitute a new behavior for the old one

Which of the following is an example of a competing behavior?

• Pulling hair

• Squeezing a ball

• Chewing nails

• Picking skin

What role does a support person play in habit reversal training?

• They provide medication

• They ignore the behavior

• They offer positive reinforcement and help detect warning signs

• They discourage any form of behavior change

What is the main focus of stimulus control?

• To create new triggers

• To reduce environmental triggers

• To increase the number of triggers

• To ignore the triggers

Which of the following is a method of stimulus control?

• Avoiding any form of journaling

• Using more instruments like tweezers

• Increasing time spent in triggering environments

• Covering the bathroom mirror