Psychotherapy for Generalized Anxiety Disorder

The present article describes the basic therapeutic techniques used in the cognitive-behavioraltherapy (CBT) of generalized anxiety disorders and reviews the methodological characteristics andoutcomes of 13 controlled clinical trials. The studies in general display rigorous methodology, andtheir outcomes are quite consistent. CBT has been shown to yield clinical improvements in bothanxiety and depression that are superior to no treatment and nonspecific control conditions (and attimes to either cognitive therapy alone or behavioral therapy alone) at both posttherapy and follow-up.CBT is also associated with low dropout rates, maintained long-term improvements, and the largestwithin-group and between-group effect sizes relative to all other comparison conditions.