Clinical Guide To alcohol Treatment

The Community Reinforcement Approach (CRA) is a broad spec-rum behavioral treatment approach for substance abuse problems. It was developed to utilize social, recreational, familial, and vocational reinforcers to aid clients in the recovery process. CRA acknowledges the powerful role of environmental contingencies in encouraging or disscouraging drinking, and thus attempts to rearrange these contin­gencies such that sober behavior is more rewarding than drinking be-havior. CRA blends this operant model with a social systems approach. [Tie overall philosophy is to use the community to reward nondrinking hehavior so that the client makes healthy lifestyle changes.