One of the leading researchers on the psychology of worry, Thomas D. Borkovec, carried out a groundbreaking study on “worry postponement.” He asked a group of college students to spot the times during a four-week period when they began to worry about something and to respond by postponing thinking about it any further until a specified “worry time” later in the day. Using this simple technique, the subjects were able to reduce the time spent worrying by almost half, and other symptoms of anxiety were also reduced. Worry postponement is now a central component of most CBT protocols for
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