Building Confidence

Typically developing school-aged children diagnosed with childhood anxiety disorders (6-11 years old) and their families

Building Confidence is a cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) that is provided to school-aged children who demonstrate clinically significant symptoms of a range of anxiety disorders (e.g., separation anxiety disorder). The format consists of individual child therapy combined with parent-training and involvement. Both children and their parents are taught fundamental CBT principles and techniques as well as integrating ways to build confidence through graduated learning and practice of age-appropriate self-independence skills. In-session exposures are extended into the home where parents assist children complete home-based exposures in the community by providing coaching in CBT strategies and naturalistic opportunities to practice and maintain treatment goals and effects. In line with these overarching treatment goals, the intervention program also works closely with the children’s schools and teachers to promote the practice and generalization of treatment goals in the school (e.g., social anxiety).

Jeffrey James Wood

• Email: jwood@gseis.ucla.edu

The goal of Building Confidence is:

• Enhance the learning and maintenance of treatment strategies via child and parent involvement in treatment

The essential components of Building Confidence include:

• Assessment of anxiety and age-appropriate self-help skill milestones
• Development hierarchy to gradually help child build confidence to anxiety provoking situations (including areas of self-help) and obtaining child/parent ratings
• Developing in-session and home-based exposure tasks that are implemented in real-word settings (i.e., not based only within the therapy setting)
• Providing psychoeducation to parents and training on CBT strategies for parents to “coach” children to develop confidence and manage anxiety symptoms
• Developing close partnerships and collaborative working relationship with school and key personnel (e.g., teachers) to bridge the gap between clinic, home, and school goals and provide real-life opportunities to build confidence and success with CBT skills and anxiety management (e.g., teacher provides opportunities for skills being learned in treatment and provides additional monitoring of acquisition and maintenance of skills)
• The use of humor and rewards to build skills and develop positive and meaningful experiences in which they are confident and successfully manage anxiety symptoms

Child/Adolescent Services

Building Confidence directly provides services to children and addresses the following:

• Childhood anxiety disorders—specifically, separation anxiety disorder, social anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and generalized anxiety disorder

Recommended Intensity

Weekly 1.5-hour session

Recommended Duration

16 weeks

Delivery Settings

This program is typically conducted in a(n):

• Community Daily Living Setting
• Outpatient Clinic
• School Setting (Including: Day Care, Day Treatment Programs, etc.)

Homework

This program does include a homework component.

Homework is given at weekly sessions.

Resources Needed to Run Program

The typical resources for implementing the program are:

Clinicians, confederates (e.g., university students or other staff who can serve as confederates for exposure activities), access to local community settings (e.g., restaurants or stores), access to a telephone (for exposures requiring phone calls), treatment room and waiting area, assistants to supervise or watch the child while therapist conducts the parent portion of the treatment session, child appropriate games or toys, child appropriate rewards (e.g., edibles, stickers), tape recorder to record sessions, paper and writing materials to create homework sheets or session materials.

Prerequisite/Minimum Provider Qualifications

Experience working in clinical setting with children and families; experience with cognitive-behavioral interventions; and at least a Master’s level clinical training experience.

Manual Information

There is a manual that describes how to deliver this program.

Training Information

There is training available for this program.

Training Contact

Training Type/Location:

Provided in Los Angeles or remotely (online)

Number of days/hours:

4-6 hours

Pre-Implementation Materials

There are no pre-implementation materials to measure organizational or provider readiness for Building Confidence.

Formal Support for Implementation

There is no formal support available for implementation of Building Confidence.

Fidelity Measures

There are fidelity measures for Building Confidence as listed below:

There is an observational checklist that is used based on video or audiotape review of a therapist’s sessions. It is available upon request from the program representative whose information is at the end of this entry.

Implementation Guides or Manuals

There are implementation guides or manuals for Building Confidence as listed below:

There is a manual: Wood, J. J., & McLeod, B. D. (2008). Child anxiety disorders: A family-based treatment manual for practitioners. W. W. Norton & Co.

Research on How to Implement the Program

Research has not been conducted on how to implement Building Confidence.

Child Welfare Outcome: Child/Family Well-Being

“What is included in the Relevant Published, Peer-Reviewed Research section?”

• Wood, J. J., Piacentini, J. C., Southam-Gerow, M., Chu, B. C., & Sigman, M. (2006). Family cognitive behavioral therapy for child anxiety disorders. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 45(3), 314321. https://doi.org/10.1097/01.chi.0000196425.88341.b0

  Type of Study: Randomized controlled trial

  Participants: 40

  Sample / Population:

  • Age — 6–13 years
  • Race/Ethnicity — 24 White, 9 Mixed/Other, 4 Latino/a, 1 African American, and 1 Asian/Pacific Islander
  • Gender — 24 Male and 16 Female
  • Status —

    Participants were parents and children with anxiety disorders from a major metropolitan area of the western United States referred through school psychologists, principals, and a child anxiety clinic.

  Location/Institution: University of California, Los Angeles

  Summary:

  The purpose of the study was to compare a family-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), the Building Confidence Program [now called Building Confidence] with traditional child-focused CBT with minimal family involvement for children with anxiety disorders. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two treatment groups: the Building Confidence Program or traditional child-focused CBT with minimal family involvement for children with anxiety disorders. Measures utilized include the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule (ADIS-CP), Clinical Global Impressions Improvement Scale (CGI), and the Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children (MASC). Results indicate that compared with child-focused CBT, the Building Confidence Program was associated with greater improvement on independent evaluators’ ratings and parent reports of child anxiety but not children’s self-reports at posttreatment. Limitations include the small sample size and lack of post-intervention follow-up.

  Length of controlled postintervention follow-up: None.

• Wood, J. J., McLeod, B. D., Piacentini, J. C., & Sigman, M. (2009). One-year follow-up of family versus child CBT for anxiety disorders: Exploring the roles of child age and parental intrusiveness. Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 40(2), 301–316. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-009-0127-z

  Type of Study: Randomized controlled trial

  Participants: 35

  Sample / Population:

  • Age — 6–13 years
  • Race/Ethnicity — 69% Caucasian, 21% Multi-racial, 3% African American, 3% Asian, and 3% Latino/a
  • Gender — 66% Male and 34% Female
  • Status —

    Participants were children with anxiety disorders and their parents from a major metropolitan area of the Western United States referred through school psychologists, principals, and a child anxiety clinic.

  Location/Institution: University of California, Los Angeles

  Summary:

  The study used the same sample as Wood et al. (2006). The purpose of the study was to compare the relative long-term benefit of family-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (FCBT) [now called Building Confidence] and child-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (CCBT) for child anxiety disorders. Participants were randomly assigned to 12–16 sessions of FCBT or CCBT. Measures utilized include the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule (ADIS-CP), Clinical Global Impressions Improvement Scale (CGI), Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children (MASC), and the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). Results indicate that children assigned to FCBT had lower anxiety scores than children assigned to CCBT on follow-up diagnostician- and parent-report scores, but not child-report scores, and that FCBT may yield a stronger treatment effect than CCBT that lasts for at least 1 year. Limitations include the small sample size.

  Length of controlled postintervention follow-up: 1 year.

• Chiu, A. W., McLeod, B. D., Har, K., & Wood, J. J. (2009). Child–therapist alliance and clinical outcomes in cognitive behavioral therapy for child anxiety disorders. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 50(6), 751–758. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2008.01996.x

  Type of Study: Randomized controlled trial

  Participants: 35

  Sample / Population:

  • Age — 6–13 years
  • Race/Ethnicity — 62% Caucasian, 27% Mixed, 6% Latino, 3% African American, and 3% Asian
  • Gender — 24 Male and 10 Female
  • Status —

    Participants were children with anxiety disorders and their parents from a major metropolitan area of the Western United States referred through school psychologists, principals, and a child anxiety clinic.

  Location/Institution: University of California, Los Angeles

  Summary:

  The study used the same sample as Wood et al. (2006). The purpose of the study was to examine the link between child–therapist alliance and outcome in the manual-guided cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), Building Confidence for children diagnosed with anxiety disorders. Participants were randomly assigned to Building Confidence or child-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (CCBT). Measures utilized include the Therapy Process Observational Coding System for Child Psychotherapy – Alliance Scale (TPOCS-A), the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule for DSM-IV: Child and Parent Versions (ADIS-C/P), the parent-report version of the Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children (MASC), the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), and the Consumer Satisfaction Form (CPSAT). Results indicate that a stronger child–therapist alliance early in treatment predicted greater improvement in parent-reported outcomes at mid-treatment but not post-treatment. However, improvement in the child–therapist alliance over the course of treatment predicted better post-treatment outcomes. Limitations include lack of child-reported measures, as well as the small sample size.

  Length of controlled postintervention follow-up: None.

There are currently no references available for Building Confidence.