Intervention Social Anxiety: Combining Parent-child Treatment

DDD is an evidence based cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)-treatment protocol for children with anxiety. This research will use the modular version of DDD, which means that the therapist will decide which modules she will use based on the specific symptoms and needs of the child. DDD consists of four parts. First, there will be psycho education in which the child learns about how anxiety can arise, when anxiety is normal, and how thoughts, emotions, and behaviour are linked. Second, the child will learn coping strategies for dealing with anxiety. Third, there will be cognitive restructuring by which that the child will learn skills to deal with anxious and negative thoughts, through challenging and experimenting. Finally, there will be exposure. In the exposure sessions, the child will face their fears step by step.

Parents will follow the SPACE program. SPACE is a theory driven, evidence-based treatment program of 12 sessions. In a structured way, parents are trained to change their own behaviour as a reaction to the symptoms of their child. First, they are trained to recognise family accommodation and slowly reduce this. Second, this program focuses on the increase in supportive reactions from parents. They are taught to accept the child's feelings, fears, and problems and to trust in the ability of the child to cope with and tolerate anxiety-related problems. These two goals are attained via a sequence of steps in the SPACE manual. Furthermore, SPACE includes additional modules that can be implemented if needed. These provide tools for conquering communal challenges that can arise during the treatment process, including dealing with extremely disruptive behaviour of children and improving parental collaboration.