The Treatment of Compulsive Hoarding with Object-Affect Fusion Informed CBT: Initial Experimental Case Evidence

Abstract

The central aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of object-affect fusion informed cognitive-behavioural therapy, with a patient presenting with compulsive hoarding. The methodology employed an A/B single case experimental design. Experimental measures illustrated an increased ability to be able to discard objects and an increased sense of associated ease of discard during treatment, with clinically significant change across a variety of robust psychometric measures in the pre-post data. The study illustrates the utility of single-case approaches in the evaluation of innovative clinical approaches and also the potential for utilizing the object-affect fusion concept in the treatment of compulsive hoarding.