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Graded Exposure Worksheet

The document describes a graded exposure worksheet technique used in CBT to help people confront and overcome their fears. The worksheet involves creating a 'staircase' to rate feared situations from most to least distressing and using it to guide a process of gradually exposing oneself to less feared situations, building up confidence over time.

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Emily Anderson
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556 views2 pages

Graded Exposure Worksheet

The document describes a graded exposure worksheet technique used in CBT to help people confront and overcome their fears. The worksheet involves creating a 'staircase' to rate feared situations from most to least distressing and using it to guide a process of gradually exposing oneself to less feared situations, building up confidence over time.

Uploaded by

Emily Anderson
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Graded Exposure Worksheet

Graded Exposure is a CBT technique that is designed to help people confront and overcome
their fears. When people are fearful of something, they tend to avoid it.

While this avoidance may help in reducing feelings of fear in the short term, over the long term it
can make the fear even worse.

Graded exposure involves creating a safe environment in which clients can become “exposed”
to the things they fear and avoid. The exposure to the feared objects, activities or situations in a
safe environment helps reduce fear and decrease avoidance.

The Graded Exposure worksheet includes 4 steps:


1. Make a list of feared situations that you tend to avoid. For example, someone with
social anxiety may typically avoid making a phone call or asking someone on a date.
2. Rate each item according to how distressed you would feel if you encountered that
situation, on a scale from 0 to 100% (0 = not at all distressed and 100 = extremely
distressed). For the person suffering with severe social anxiety, asking someone on a
date may be rated a 10 on the scale, while making a phone call instead might be rated
closer to a 3 or 4.
3. Rank items from most-feared (i.e., highest distress rating) at the top of the staircase to
least-feared (i.e., lowest distress rating) at the bottom of the staircase.
4. The staircase can now be used to guide a process of the graded exposure. Clients
can be guided to start exposing themselves to the least-feared items, building up as
more confidence is gained. Key principles of exposure should be discussed (e.g. stay in
situation without escaping, attempt multiple repeats of each exposure to encourage
extinction).

1 © PositivePsychology.com
Graded Exposure Worksheet
Worksheet

Construct a staircase with situations you tend to avoid because of fear or anxiety, with most-feared items at the top and least-feared items
at the bottom. Rate each item according to how distressed you would feel if you encountered that situation, on a scale from 0 to 10 (0 = not
at all distressed and 10 = extremely distressed).

Most
Feared
Situation

Anxiety
Rating
/100%

/100%

/100%

/100%

/100%

/100%

Least Anxiety
Feared Rating
Situation /100%

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