ELIMINATION OF THUMB-SUCKING AS A TREATMENT FOR SEVERE TRICHOTILLOMANIA

A 5-year-old girl presented with a 3-year history of severe trichotill omania and alopecia. The trichotillomania was observed to covary, or o ccur only in the presence of thumb-sucking. Thus, the elimination of t humb-sucking was targeted as a treatment for trichotillomania. The inv estigation evaluated the relative effectiveness of a standard aversive taste treatment, a response-dependent alarm and a response-disrupting thumb-post. Results indicated that only the thumb-post completely eli minated thumb-sucking and the covarying trichotillomania. These result s suggest that when trichotillomania is a benign habit disorder, the t reatment of a covarying habit such as thumb-sucking can be an effectiv e treatment alternative and that resilient thumb-sucking can be effect ively managed with an easily implemented thumb-post that requires litt le supervision and provides long-term success.