Counterconditioning in which people relax while being exposed to stimuli that elicit fear is referred to as

Counter conditioning in which people relax while being exposed to stimuli that elicit fear is referred to as systematic desensitization.

Explanation:

Systematic desensitization is an effective therapy treatment used by psychologists to help people respond to their fears. In this kind of therapy, the patient learns to overcome his/her fair towards any stimuli.

Firstly, several exercises are taught to the patient for relaxing. Then a list of events is made and practiced so that the patient learns to relax at the time of encounter with the stimulus. Though systematic desensitization is a very effective therapy, but it has become less common over the years.      

as university of miami psychologists debra lieberman and adam smith pointed out in a recent article in the journal current directions in psychological science, humans have social and psychological mechanisms to deter incest. with very few exceptions, marriages between brothers and sisters and between parents and their children are verboten in every human culture. the primary psychological anti-incest mechanism is the yuck response. even the idea of sex with their mom or dad, bro or sis is upsetting to most people. the psychologist jonathan haidt has found that nearly everyone is repelled by the prospect of brother-sister sex, even in hypothetical situations in which there is no chance of pregnancy).

the biological cost of incest

this raises an interesting question: just what’s so bad about incest? sure, having sex with your dad or your sister seems gross — but why? some anthropologists have argued that incest taboos are learned social conventions. this explanation, however, doesn’t make sense to me as it does not explain the widespread existence of anti-incest mechanisms in creatures ranging from cockroaches to chimpanzees. second, the incest taboo is about as close to a universal law as human moral rules get.

why should mechanisms to avoid incest be so widespread both in nature and across human societies? the answer is simple. the problem with having sex close with relatives is that there is an astonishingly high chance that your offspring will be born with a serious birth defect.