Further, the combination, particularly when given during the prodromal period, reduces the degree of relapse. We need a broad conception of how the brain functions in terms of its inputs and outputs to be able to obtain a proper understanding of therapeutic interventions. First of all, we need to acknowledge that the brain is the organ of behavior, learning, thinking, and affect. It not only helps to form experience, but also is affected by experience. Work by E.R. Kandel has demonstrated structure change in neurological networks as a result of experience.
Brain function is influenced for better or worse by drugs of various types.
The drugs can cause malfunction as well as normalize dysfunction. The point here is that both psychotherapy and medication can affect the brain in the same way, following the final common pathway. Research at McGill University has demonstrated that when either cognitive therapy or pharmacotherapy of obsessive compulsive disorder is successful they produce identical changes in the brain. Specifically, they show an increase in serotonin metabolism in the putamen of the brain. Thus, future studies of the brain can look at not only the effects of drugs on the brain but how input into the audio-visual channels by a psychotherapist can produce changes in the brain.