Nail Biting Essay

1123 Words5 Pages
Nail biting is currently classified as an impulse control disorder. It may be just removing rough cuticles or a loose hangnail, but for some people this problem is much more serious. Nail biting is prevalent in nearly 45% of adolescents and 4.5% of adults. (Gregory, 1995; Heaton & Mountford, 1992; Leung & Robson, 1990).The effects of nail biting are; damaged tissue around the nail, ease of infection and root damage to an individual’s teeth. A compulsive nail biter continues their behavior despite these side effects. Nail biting is often correlated with co-morbid diseases and anxiety. Psychologists use multiple techniques to prove and disprove these assumptions. The Functional Analysis and Treatment of Nail Biting, study, used the simplified habit reversal (SHR) technique on a 24 year old graduate student who was a self proclaimed nail bitter. SHR is a widespread technique used in psychological studies. SHR is composed of three components; awareness training, competing response, and social support. It is commonly used to rid individuals of bad habits by first making them aware of their habit. Second, A competing response is used to activate a different behavior that and individual chooses to do, in place of the undesirable behavior. Finally the third component is social support, which is similar to a therapy session. (CITE ARTICLE) This SHR study was conducted to determine if an SHR could influence an individual’s compulsive nail biting. The first functional analysis was used as the base. It showed that out of eight catagories ‘The highest prevalence’s occurred, ‘during the alone condition at 73.33% of the intervals.’(CITE APA). The second functional analysis added minimal SHR awareness to the participant and produced similar results. These results favored the belief that nail biting was maintained by automatic reinforcement. (CITE ARTICLE) This refers to
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