ABSTRACT
Strongly influenced by the work of I. Pavlov and the learning theorists, Joseph Wolpe has developed a comprehensive systematic treatment of symptoms that result from specific anxieties. Several new psychotherapeutic techniques are described that have been derived directly from the reciprocal inhibition principle and have turned out to be of value. Pavlov's theory of psychotherapeutic effects follows directly from his theory of the basis of neurosis. According to Pavlov, normal cortical function requires a balance between excitatory and inhibitory processes. In an interesting book, J. Dollard and N. E. Miller have tried to interpret the psychotherapeutic process in terms of the Hullian theory of learning. Neurotic symptoms are regarded as due to "distorted discharges" that come from the damming up of the energies of repressed memories, and the essential aim of psychoanalytic psychotherapy is to remove the repressions and so let the memories be reintegrated into the patient's conscious life.
