Assessing Readiness to Change among Clients Seeking Help for Hypersexual Behavior

Mental health professionals may erroneously assume that clients seeking help for hypersexual behavior are ready to begin working on their issues at the outset of treatment. Prochaska and DiClemente (e.g., 1983 Prochaska, J. O. and DiClemente, C. C. 1983. Stages and processes of self-change of smoking: Toward an integrative model of change. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology., 51: 390–395. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 1984 Prochaska, J. O. and DiClemente, C. C. 1984. The transtheoretical approach: Crossing the traditional boundaries of change, Homewood, IL: Irwin. [Google Scholar]) proposed the transtheoretical model (TTM) stages of change to advance their belief that clients move through several stages when attempting to alter specific target behaviors. If a clinician gets ahead of a client by administering interventions that are improperly matched with the client's readiness to change, treatment may be prematurely terminated or high levels of resistance may be encountered during therapy. In this study, clients (N = 67) who were referred for treatment in a specialty outpatient clinic for hypersexual behavior completed the Sexual Compulsivity Scale (Kalichman et al., 1994 Kalichman, S. C., Johnson, J. R., Adair, V., Rompa, D., Multhauf, K. and Kelly, J. A. 1994. Sexual sensation seeking: Scale development and predicting AIDS-risk behavior among homosexually active men. Journal of Personality Assessment., 62: 385–397. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Kalichman & Rompa, 1995 Kalichman, S. C. and Rompa, D. 1995. Sexual sensation seeking and compulsivity scales: Reliability, validity, and predicting HIV risk behavior. Journal of Personality Assessment., 65: 586–601. [Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar], 2001 Kalichman, S. C. and Rompa, D. 2001. The sexual compulsivity scale: Further development and use with HIV-positive persons. Journal of Personality Assessment., 76: 379–395. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) and the Stages of Change Scale (McConnaughy, DiClemente, Prochaska, & Velicer, 1989 McConnaughy, E. A., DiClemente, C. C., Prochaska, J. O. and Velicer, W. F. 1989. Stages of change in psychotherapy: A follow-up report. Psychotherapy., 26: 494–503. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; McConnaughy, Prochaska, & Velicer, 1983 McConnaughy, E. A., Prochaska, J. O. and Velicer, W. F. 1983. Stages of change in psychotherapy: Measurement and sample profiles. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, and Practice., 20: 368–375. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The data collected from these measures revealed that 70% (n = 47) of clients who expressed an interest in receiving help with issues related to hypersexuality also had high levels of ambivalence about the changes they desired to make and that individuals with ADHD were significantly (chi-square, p ≤ .001) more likely to be in the contemplation stage than subjects presenting with alternative diagnoses. Implications for these finding are discussed and suggestions for future research are offered.