2-Day Growing Up Anxious-Treating Anxiety Disorders in a Generation Hyper-focused on Achievement, Technology and Safety – Steve O’Brien

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We all want kids to be successful, safe, and secure, but such good intentions are having unintended consequences.

Three societal ingredients…. a hyper-academic mindset, preoccupation with safety, and a tech-obsessed society… are fueling childhood anxiety, leaving kids fearful, avoidant, and ill-equipped for adulthood.

Watch child psychologist Steve O’Brien, Psy.D., for 2 days filled with practical strategies as he presents a three-level treatment model for childhood anxiety using targeted, evidenced-based therapies to:

• Connect with and “rewire” anxious children and families
• Provide child-friendly instruction about anxiety and the brain
• Promote self-expression and healthy coping in shut-down kids
• Reduce debilitating social anxiety in adolescents
• Treat technology-related worries, obsessions, and compulsions
• Develop anxiety-free safety plans for distressed kids and parents

Don’t miss out on this cutting-edge program for equipping and empowering kids to not only cope with anxiety, but to thrive as they develop a growing sense of both competence and confidence! 

1. Summarize the psychosocial characteristics of the “internet generation” and their contribution to anxiety development in children and adolescents.
2. Describe the primary developmental, systemic, academic, and social-technological factors relevant to the development and maintenance of anxiety disorders in children and families.
3. Identify the various social, emotional, and behavioral manifestations of anxiety in children in multiple contexts, including home and school.
4. Utilize semi-structured observational and interview methods for collecting relevant history and clinical information with anxious and minimally verbal children and their parents/caretakers.
5. Determine effective rapport-building strategies with anxious, resistant, and defensive children and parents/caretakers.
6. Adopt a ‘parent consultation’ model as a supplement to individual child and family therapy and as part of an integrated treatment approach.
7. Conduct ‘Child-Focused Family Therapy’ using therapeutic agendas and directive communication techniques.
8. Teach children a developmentally appropriate psychoeducation framework for understanding the relationship between anxiety, the brain, and the body.
9. Implement self-regulation strategies to reduce child/adolescent anxiety and promote adaptive coping.
10. Identify clinical, co-occurring diagnostic patterns with respect to anxiety and related disorders in children and how to determine initial treatment targets.
11. Distinguish between over-arching versus disorder-specific interventions for child/adolescent anxiety. As well as the 3 levels of anxiety treatment.
12. Implement and integrate developmentally-appropriate CBT, desensitization, and exposure therapy techniques to enhance treatment with anxious children.

GROWING UP ANXIOUS – 3 KEY INGREDIENTS
EARLY EMPHASIS ON HIGH ACHIEVEMENT AND PERFORMANCE

• Emotional costs of a hyper-academic mindset and over-evaluation
• Performance philosophy pitfalls: perfectionism and procrastination
• Consequences of strong individualism: anti-collaborative attitudes

TECHNOLOGY IMMERSION: PLUGGED IN BUT TUNED OUT

• Tech-savvy, socially naive
• Fearless online, fearful offline
• Gratification-dependent, grit-deficient

PREOCCUPATION WITH SAFETY AND POTENTIAL THREAT

• Overprotected but underdeveloped….socially and emotionally
• How dysregulated adults promote anxiety-ridden kids
• Failure to launch: Why “adulting” is difficult and frightening

INTEGRATING EVIDENCED-BASED TREATMENT APPROACHES

• Behavior therapy/modification
• Cognitive-behavior therapy
• Family-focused/systemic therapy
• Interpersonal therapy
• Play/art/creative therapies
• Mindfulness-based therapies

GUIDELINES FOR RAPPORT-BUILDING AND CLINICAL INTERVIEWING

• Semi-structured parent interviews: Combining engagement with efficiency
• Developmentally-sensitive child interviews: Integrating observation, play and dialogue
• Parent consultation: Constructing a framework for parental involvement

PSYCHOEDUCATION FOR PARENTS AND KIDS: THE FIRST INTERVENTION

• Teaching parents about their child’s overactive brain
• Giving a child-friendly “tour of the brain”
• Highlighting the mind-body connection
• Social Anxiety Disorder
  • Evaluating cognitive versus physiological features
  • Cognitive-behavioral methods for getting teens out of their heads and into the world
  • Role-playing and free association games for promoting real-time interaction
  • Desensitization strategies for combating social avoidance

BIOPSYCHOSOCIAL TREATMENT: THE SECOND INTERVENTION

• “LOWERING THE TEMPERATURE, SLOWING THE PACE”
• Reducing Emotional Intensity and Conflict for a Calmer Environment
• Healthy habits and daily transition rituals
• Self-expression and support-seeking skills
• 3 R’s of anxiety management: Recognize, Relax, Redirect

TARGETED TREATMENT FOR MAJOR (DSM-5™) ANXIETY DISORDERS: THE THIRD INTERVENTION

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder
  • Identifying manifestations of chronic worry
  • Cognitive strategies for discrediting the “what-if? person”
  • Self-talk for empowering the “helpful coach”
  • Cognitive-behavioral redirection for worries
  • Paradoxical relaxation for overachievers
  • Separation Anxiety Disorder
  • Assessing psychological and somatic components
  • Pre-treatment preparation: It’s all about the plan
  • Developing a treatment-support team
  • Action plans for high-distress episodes
  • Strategies for distressed/enmeshed parents
• Phobias and Panic Disorder
  • Cognitive and physical/physiological symptoms
  • Essential ingredients for desensitization
  • “Challenge ladders” for gradual exposure
  • Planning-for-panic strategies
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
  • Variations in obsessive-compulsive symptomatology
  • “Brain challenges” for rigid perfectionists
  • Mindfulness strategies: “Balloon breathing and wet noodles” for high-threat perceivers
• Controlled withdrawal and replacement for tech-addicts

CO-OCCURRING DISORDERS: TREATMENT IMPLICATIONS, RISKS, AND LIMITATIONS

• Depressive Disorders
• Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder
• Autism Spectrum Disorders

ANXIETY-RIDDEN AT SCHOOL: CONSIDERATIONS AND CLASSROOM APPLICATIONS

• Relationship-building with distressed/disruptive kids
• Dealing with the (dreaded) 3 D’s:
• Defiance, Disrespect, Disruption
• Creating a calm, responsive classroom
• Reducing task avoidance and test anxiety
• Managing compulsive technology usage
• Identifying, intervening, and preventing bullying
• Tips for (post) pandemic adjustment

MEASURING TREATMENT PROGRESS

• Evaluating symptomatology and functional level
• School consultation and recommendations
• Medication: Guidelines for discussion and referral