Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Treatments and drugs
By Mayo Clinic staffTreating oppositional defiant disorder generally involves several types of psychotherapy and training for your child — as well as for you and your co-parent. If your child has co-existing conditions, particularly ADHD, medications may help significantly improve symptoms.
The cornerstones of treatment for ODD usually include:
- Individual and family therapy. Individual counseling for your child may help him or her learn to manage anger and express his or her feelings more healthfully. Family counseling may help improve your communication and relationships, and help members of your family learn how to work together.
- Parent-child interaction therapy (PCIT). During PCIT, therapists coach parents while they interact with their children. In one approach, the therapist sits behind a one-way mirror and, using an "ear bug" audio device, guides parents through strategies that reinforce their children's positive behavior. Research has shown that as a result of PCIT, parents learn more-effective parenting techniques, the behavior problems of children decrease, and the quality of the parent-child relationship improves.
- Cognitive problem solving training. This type of therapy is aimed at helping your child identify and change through patterns that are leading to behavior problems. Research shows that an approach called collaborative problem solving — in which you and your child work together to come up with solutions that work for both of you — is highly effective at improving ODD-related problems.
- Social skills training. Your child also might benefit from therapy that will help him or her learn how to interact more positively and effectively with peers.
- Parent training. A mental health provider with experience treating ODD may help you develop skills that will allow you to parent in a way that's more positive and less frustrating for you and your child. In some cases, your child may participate in this type of training with you, so that everyone in your family develops shared goals for how to handle problems.
As part of parent training, you may learn how to:
- Give effective timeouts
- Avoid power struggles
- Remain calm and unemotional in the face of opposition
- Recognize and praise your child's good behaviors and positive characteristics
- Offer acceptable choices to your child, giving him or her a certain amount of control
- Establish a schedule for the family that includes specific meals that will be eaten at home together, and specific activities one or both parents will do with the child
- Limit consequences to those that can be consistently reinforced and if possible, last for a limited amount of time
Although some parent management techniques may seem like common sense, learning to use them in the face of opposition isn't easy, especially if there are other stressors at home. Learning these skills will require consistent practice and patience.
Most important in treatment is for you to show consistent, unconditional love and acceptance of your child — even during difficult and disruptive situations. Don't be too hard on yourself. This process can be tough for even the most patient parents.
- Oppositional defiant disorder. In: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM-IV-TR. 4th ed. Arlington, Va.: American Psychiatric Association; 2000. http://www.psychiatryonline.com. Accessed Sept. 28, 2009.
- Children with oppositional defiant disorder. American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. http://aacap.org/page.ww?name=Children+with+Oppositional+Defiant+Disorder§ion=Facts+for+Families. Accessed Sept. 28, 2009.
- Ursano AM, et al. Disorders usually first diagnosed in infancy, childhood, or adolescence. In: Hales RE, et al., eds. The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Psychiatry. 5th ed. Arlington, Va.: American Psychiatric Association; 2008. http://www.psychiatryonline.com. Accessed Sept. 28, 2009.
- Hamilton SS. Oppositional defiant disorder. American Family Physician. 2008;78:861.
- Practice parameter for the assessment and treatment of children and adolescents with oppositional defiant disorder. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. 2007;46:126.
- Parent-child interaction therapy with at-risk families. Child Welfare Information Gateway. http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/f_interactbulletin/f_interactbulletin.pdf. Accessed Oct. 2, 2009.
- Wall CA (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. Oct. 2, 2009.
