**5. Assessment**

The Children's Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (CY-BOCS) is mostly using tool and often referring as the "gold standard" measurement for assessment of pediatric OCD. It involves two subscales for Obsessions Severity and Compulsions Severity, and total score is estimating with these two subscales [65, 66]. Also there are some other assessment tools like the Children's Florida Obsessive Compulsive Inventory (C-FOCI), Leyton Obsessional Inventory-Child Version, the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule for DSM-IV: Child and Parent Version (ADIS-C/P) which could be used for OCD assessment in pediatric population [67–69].

**8. Treatment**

medication [85].

**8.1. Cognitive behavioral therapy**

adolescent cases in the 1980s [87].

negative reinforcement occurs over time (**Figure 1**) [88].

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is recommended for the first-line treatment in mild to moderate OCD, but in moderate to severe OCD cases, it is recommended to support CBT with

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder in Children and Adolescents

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.70612

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CBT is a kind of psychotherapy which is developed on the basis of learning theories in psychology and the principles of cognitive psychology. The purpose of this therapy is to change emotions and incompatible behaviors by using psychotherapeutic methods based on these principles [86]. Behavioral therapies began to be used in the treatment of emotional and behavioral problems of young people in the 1950s. These behavioral approaches are based on the theories of Thorndike, Watson, and Bandura, and classical and operant conditioning have been used to treat behavioral disorders seen in infants and children. Cognitive therapies were developed by Aaron Beck in the 1970s and started to be used in the treatment of child and

According to CBT, the mental condition of a person is the result of the mutual interaction of the environment, relationships, the biological structure, emotions, cognition, and behaviors. Psychotherapeutic methods can only be applied to cognition and behaviors of a person [86]. According to learning theory, compulsions reduce distress that triggered by obsession so that

**Figure 1.** The obsessive-compulsive cycle used by Piacentini et al. [89] to describe OCD's mechanism.
