Social Phobia

Ronald M. Rapee earned his Ph.D. from the University of New South Wales in Australia, and is currently Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at Macquarie University, Sydney. Dr. Rapee has published extensively on child and adolescent anxiety in international journals and is the author and editor of several books. William C. Sanderson, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Director of the Cognitive Behavior Therapy Program at Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, New York. Dr. Sanderson, who completed a clinical fellowship in cognitive therapy with Dr. Aaron Beck at the University of Pennsylvania and specializes in the treatment of anxiety and depressive disorders, has published two books and more than sixty articles and chapters. An appointed advisor to the DSM-IV Anxiety Disorders Work-group, he is currently a member of the Task Force on Psychological Interventions, APA Division of Clinical Psychology.

Drs. Rapee and Sanderson furnish a clear guide to self-monitoring, cognitive restructuring, social skills and assertiveness training, and exposure to the phobic situation, in a step-by-step manual that emphasizes the importance of the client-therapist relationship and allows for freedom of individual therapeutic style. A special section outlines a new technique, attention training, which helps clients to focus on the task at hand rather than on their anxiety over how their performance will be perceived. The book is an ideal blend of evidence-based theory with clinical application.