quality:corruption
Behavioral therapy

CBT proposes four assumptions essential to the approach to treatment: addiction is a learned behavior, it emerges in an environmental context, it is developed and maintained by particular thought patterns and processes, and CBT can be integrated well with other treatment and management approaches as they all have similar goals. CBT, (e.g., relapse prevention), motivational interviewing, and a community reinforcement approach are effective interventions with moderate effect sizes.

Interventions focusing on impulsivity and sensation seeking are successful in decreasing substance use. Cue exposure uses ideas from classical conditioning theory to change the learned behavioral response of someone addicted to a cue or trigger. Contingency management uses ideas from operant conditioning to use meaningful positive reinforcements to influence addiction behaviors towards sobriety.

Addiction recovery groups draw on different methods and models and rely on the success of vicarious learning, where people imitate behavior they observe as rewarding among their own social group or status as well as those perceived as being of a higher status.

Substance addiction in children is complex and requires multifacted behavioral therapy. Family therapy and school-based interventions have had minor but lasting results. Innovative treatments are still needed for areas where relevant therapies are unavailable.

Consistent aerobic exercise, especially endurance exercise (e.g., marathon running), prevents the development of certain drug addictions and is an effective adjunct treatment for drug addiction, and for psychostimulant addiction in particular. Consistent aerobic exercise magnitude-dependently (i.e., by duration and intensity) reduces drug addiction risk, which appears to occur through the reversal of drug induced addiction-related neuroplasticity. Exercise may prevent the development of drug addiction by altering ΔFosB or c-Fos immunoreactivity in the striatum or other parts of the reward system. Aerobic exercise decreases drug self-administration, reduces the likelihood of relapse, and induces opposite effects on striatal dopamine receptor D (DRD2) signaling (increased DRD2 density) to those induced by addictions to several drug classes (decreased DRD2 density). Consequently, consistent aerobic exercise may lead to better treatment outcomes when used as an adjunct treatment for drug addiction.

With a combination of tools such as behavioral therapy, a balanced lifestyle, and individualized relapse plans, relapse is can be more successfully avoided.