Anticipatory avoidance learning for the treatment of homosexuality: Recent developments and an automatic aversion therapy system

Lesbian and bisexual women's experiences of aversion therapy in England

“…We found references in the psychiatric literature to four women being subjected to anticipatory avoidance therapy at Crumpsall Hospital in North Manchester in the mid to late 1960s ( Feldman and MacCulloch, 1964 ; MacCulloch and Feldman, 1967 ). This technique was a revision of the classic aversion therapy treatment, which was developed by behavioural psychologists Feldman and MacCulloch to treat male and female homosexuality ( MacCulloch, Birtles, and Feldman, 1971 ). In this procedure, patients could ‘choose’ to not receive the electric shock if they pressed a button to remove the sexualised female image, within a certain time limit, and replace it with a male image (or vice versa, depending on whether they were treating men or women).…”

Recent trends and new developments in the treatment of homosexuality.

“…The use of aversive conditioning procedures with homosexuals is growing rapidly and a number of good case reports and clinical studies are available (e.g., Birk, Huddleston, Miller, & Cohler, 1971;Colson, 1972;Fookes, 1969;Johnsgard & Schumacher, 1970;MacCulloch & Feldman, 1967;MacCulloch, Birtles & Feldman, 1971;MacCulloch, Feldman & Pinshof, 1965;McConaghy, 1969McConaghy, , 1971Tanner, 1973).The continued interchange between clinical application and theoretical development in this area is unique in its extent and is to be strongly encouraged.…”

Methodological issues in evaluating the effectiveness of aversion therapies for institutionalised child molesters.

“…A difficulty with lever pressing is that it is more easily used as a measure of the course of aversion therapy (e.g. MacCulloch, Birtles and Feldman, 1971) than it is as an indicator of sexual preference in subjects who have not received aversion therapy. In this latter situation, lever pressing in a choice paradigm is as easily fakeable as verbal descriptions of the stimulus objects' relative attractiveness.…”

“…A social influence model can handle the finding (Freund, 1960) that the sexual orientation of self-referred homosexuals was more successfully changed than that of homosexuals who were forced into treatment in terms of committment or belief. The report that different methods of aversion therapy are superior to psychotherapy (MacCulloch, Birtles and Feldman, 1971) implies that the aversion therapies employ different social influence variables or employ the same variables more effectively.…”