Both Desensitization and implosive therapy resulted in significant decreases in scores on Sarason's Test Anxiety Scale. However, the desensitization group also demonstrated a significant reduction in state anxiety assessed during simulated testing sessions and a significant increase in grade point average, while the implosive therapy group showed…

This study examined the effectiveness of systematic desensitization for reducing the anxiety of highly test-anxious students who differed in their level of generalized anxiety. (Author)

A group cognitive modification treatment was effective in significantly reducing test anxiety as assessed by (a) test performance, (b) self-reports and (c) grade point average. (Author)

In keeping with a learning theory approach, it is postulated that fear of examinations was a learned maladaptive pattern of behavior. Therefore, counter-conditioning through progressive relaxation and systematic desensitization was utilized to eliminate the maladaptive response in this case. (Author)

Procedural variations were compared for a vicarious group treatment of test anxiety involving observation of videotapes depicting systematic desensitization of a model. The theoretical implications of the present study and the feasibility of using videotaped materials to treat test anxiety and other avoidance responses in school settings are…

College students were treated with either a standard or modified version of systematic desensitization. Relative to a no-treatment control group, both treatment methods produced significant reductions in both the treated and untreated fears. The implications these findings have for two alternative conceptions of systematic desensitization are…

The present study compared the effects of assertion with that of progressive relaxation training in systematic desensitization. Nineteen Ss were selected on the basis of exemplifying high debilitating test anxiety according to Alpert and Haber's (1960) Achievement Anxiety Test. Results showed that test anxious Ss who received either relaxation or…

This study compared the effectiveness of systematic desensitization and training in efficient study methods for reducing test anxiety among subjects selected on the basis of two types of self reported anxiety. Desensitization offered more promise as a treatment method for test anxiety than did training in study skills. (Author)

Two groups of college students participated in test-anxiety reduction programs at a Learning Resource Center. One group (six students) participated in systematic desensitization procedures and the other group (17 students) was exposed to study skills methods of reducing test anxiety. Students in both groups were pretested and posttested with the…

Relaxation as self-control and desensitization were compared to a wait-list control in reduction of rest and other anxieties. Active treatments differed significantly from the control treatment. Subjects in both treatments reported less debilitating test anxiety, whereas desensitization subjects showed greater facilitating test anxiety. (Author)

Test-anxious students were assigned to four treatment groups, a placebo group, or an untreated control group. Four treatment groups resulted from combinations of two treatment rationales (active coping and passive reciprocal inhibition) and two treatment procedures (self-control and standard). Treatment groups were equally effective in reducing…

Effects of systematic desensitization and anxiety management training in reducing test anxiety and generalizing to other anxieties were compared. Both desensitization and anxiety management training produced significant reduction of text anxiety, but by follow-up, anxiety management training produced significantly more test-anxiety reduction on…

Test-anxious subjects (N=19) participated in an outcome study comparing systematic desensitization, cue-controlled relaxation, and no treatment. The treatment groups demonstrated significant improvement on the self-report measures of test and state anxiety but not on the behavioral indices. The potential advantages of this technique over…

The results of this study of two groups of nursing students, one administered desensitization sessions, the other not, agree with earlier studies which indicate that massed group desensitization is an efficient and efficacious procedure for the reduction of anxiety-based disorders. (Author/KM)