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General CBT Skills~15 min

Safety Behaviours Identification & Drop Plan

Identify safety behaviours that maintain anxiety, understand their costs, and plan experiments to gradually drop them.

Written by Tarun Vermani, Trainee Clinical Psychologist Last reviewed

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Safety behaviours are things you do to prevent a feared outcome or manage anxiety in the moment. While they feel helpful, they actually maintain anxiety by preventing you from learning that you can cope without them. Use this worksheet to identify your safety behaviours, understand what they cost you, and plan how to test dropping them.

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The Feared Situation

Safety Behaviours

#Safety BehaviourWhat It's Supposed to PreventWhat It Actually Costs MePlan for Dropping ItActions
1

Drop Experiment

Not at allSomewhatCompletely
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When to use the Safety Behaviours Identification & Drop Plan

The Safety Behaviours Identification & Drop Plan is an interactive cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) worksheet. As a core CBT skill it is used right across the model, with presentations including depression, anxiety, OCD, trauma and low self-esteem, rather than being tied to a single diagnosis.

It is designed to be used within therapy rather than as a standalone self-help tool: a therapist introduces it, works through it collaboratively, and helps make sense of what it surfaces. You can preview the full worksheet above, then assign it digitally for clients to complete between sessions on any device — or download it as a print-ready PDF.

How it works

Most people work through it in around 15 minutes. It moves through three short steps:

  1. The Feared Situation
  2. Safety Behaviours
  3. Drop Experiment

Completed on the Formulate platform, your client's answers are saved automatically and shared straight back to you, so you can review them before the next session rather than waiting for a paper copy to come back.

The CBT approach behind it

In common with other CBT methods, the Safety Behaviours Identification & Drop Plan works by noticing the links between situations, thoughts, feelings, physical sensations and behaviour — and finding practical ways to change unhelpful patterns. The aim is not positive thinking but a clearer, shared understanding of what keeps a difficulty going — and practical, testable ways to change it.

Because it is a CBT tool it stays focused on the here-and-now links between thoughts, feelings, the body and behaviour, and it works best as one part of a wider course of therapy rather than as advice or a diagnosis.

Evidence & sources

This worksheet is grounded in established cognitive behavioural therapy theory and practice. Key sources include:

  • Wells, A. (1997). Cognitive Therapy of Anxiety Disorders. Chichester: Wiley.
  • Clark, D.M. & Wells, A. (1995). A cognitive model of social phobia. In R.G. Heimberg et al. (Eds.), Social Phobia: Diagnosis, Assessment, and Treatment. New York: Guilford Press.
  • Salkovskis, P.M. (1985). Obsessional-compulsive problems: A cognitive-behavioural analysis. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 23(5), 571-583. doi:10.1016/0005-7967(85)90105-6

For use alongside professional support

Formulate provides educational CBT resources for use with a qualified therapist. They are not a substitute for professional assessment, diagnosis, or crisis care.

If you need urgent help now:

  • Emergency services: 999 — if you or someone else is in immediate danger
  • Samaritans: 116 123 — free, day or night, 365 days a year
  • SANEline: 0800 689 5555 — 4:30pm–10:30pm, every day

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