Effectiveness of Psychodrama in the Treatment of Ornithophobia (A Case Study)

Psychodrama is one of the psychotherapy methods in which drama techniques are used to treatment of many psychological disorders. This method was introduced by J. L. Moreno at 1921. Psychodrama is now used to treatment of disorders with emotional bases such as depression and interpersonal problems. Though in this research, researchers have used psychodrama to treat the Bird phobia as an anxiety disorder. The main aim of the present research was testing the effectiveness of psychodrama for treatment of Bird phobia. The research started with this important problem that whether psychodrama can be effective for treatment of Bird phobia. This experimental research has tried to answer the mentioned problem.

Bird phobia was initially diagnosed in the patient using criteria of DSM IV-TR, then rate of the patient's fear was measured by a researcher-made test and a behavioral test –patient's encounter with a bird. This rate of the patient's fear and its changes was checked two times again and analyzed quantitative and qualitative. Duration of the treatment program lasted eight sessions (2 hours per session) and generally a month.

Results of the tests and changes in the patient's behaviors (touching the bird without symptoms of anxiety) showed that psychodrama was effective to treatment of the patient.

This result is similar to former researches that studied the effectiveness of psychodrama on treatment of other psychological disorders. The result of this research shows that psychodrama can be used to treatment animal’s phobia too. Although more researches with more subjects must be done. This work helps psychotrapists to use psychodrama techniques with more certainty.