Abstract
Recently, cognitive and behavioral therapies （CBT） have been used successfully to treat several mental disorders （e.g., depression, anxiety, insomnia） and medical diseases （e.g., irritable bowel syndrome, chronic pain）. Randomized control trial studies have demonstrated that such treatment is more effective in treating these issues than treatment received by a control group （e.g., treatment as usual or a wait list）. CBT is essentially a form of psychotherapy with the following goals: （1） to help the patient to recognize his/her controversial cognitions and behaviors, （2） to modify these cognitions and behaviors, and （3） to improve the symptoms and to enhance the patient’s self-control capabilities. This treatment originates from such learning theory aspects as respondent conditioning, operant conditioning, and so on. In this paper, I disucussed the possibility of utilizing a behavioral principle based on learning theory in clinical settings. In addition, I introduced evidence of the effectiveness of CBT in the field of dental sleep medicine.
