A client may understand every reason to avoid a substance or behavior, yet one familiar trigger can overpower that knowledge.
That gap between knowing and acting is where urge-focused trauma work can become clinically important.
The DeTUR protocol, or Desensitization of Triggers and Urge Reprocessing, applies EMDR methods to cravings and dysfunctional behaviors. It targets the present cues behind urges while building positive recovery goals and planning for relapse risks.
DeTUR Protocol EMDR
The DeTUR protocol is an EMDR-based urge reduction protocol developed for addictions, cravings, relapse triggers, and repetitive dysfunctional behaviors.
Instead of beginning with a traumatic memory, DeTUR often begins with current triggers that create an urge. The client builds an internal resource, defines a positive treatment goal, rates each trigger’s pull, and processes those triggers using bilateral stimulation.
| Full name | Desensitization of Triggers and Urge Reprocessing |
| Therapy family | Specialized EMDR protocol |
| Main focus | Triggers, urges, cravings, and dysfunctional behaviors |
| Common uses | Substance use, gambling, problematic internet use, and other compulsive behaviors |
| Starting target | Present cues that activate an urge or relapse pattern |
| Main measurement | Level of Urge, commonly rated from 0 to 10 |
| Main goal | Reduce trigger-linked urges and strengthen adaptive behavior |
| Treatment context | One part of a broader addiction treatment and recovery plan |
| Does not replace | Detoxification, medical care, medication support, safety planning, or comprehensive addiction treatment |
What Does DeTUR Stand For?
DeTUR stands for Desensitization of Triggers and Urge Reprocessing. Each word describes a different part of the clinical work.
- Desensitization: Reducing the emotional and physical pull connected to a trigger.
- Triggers: People, places, emotions, memories, routines, sensations, or situations that activate an urge.
- Urge reprocessing: Using EMDR procedures to weaken automatic urge responses and support more adaptive choices.
The client is not simply taught to ignore cravings. The protocol helps identify what activates them and changes how those cues are experienced.
Who Developed the DeTUR Protocol?
Psychologist Arnold “A.J.” Popky developed DeTUR as an EMDR-based approach for addictions, urges, and dysfunctional behaviors.
Popky built the protocol around internal resource accessing, positive treatment goals, trigger identification, Level of Urge ratings, desensitization, and relapse prevention. His approach applies the Adaptive Information Processing model to present addiction triggers while allowing deeper trauma material to emerge when clinically relevant.
What Is DeTUR Used For?
DeTUR is most commonly used when a clear trigger creates an urge to use a substance or repeat a harmful behavior.
- Alcohol or drug cravings
- Relapse triggers during addiction recovery
- Gambling urges
- Problematic internet or gaming behavior
- Compulsive shopping or sexual behavior
- Food-related urges, when clinically appropriate
- Repetitive self-defeating or dysfunctional behaviors
- Urges connected to shame, stress, loneliness, trauma, or emotional avoidance
How the DeTUR Protocol Works in EMDR Therapy
DeTUR focuses first on the cues that activate the addictive behavior. The therapist identifies those triggers, measures their current pull, and processes them one at a time.
The work usually includes:
- Building a positive internal resource state.
- Creating a clear and attractive positive treatment goal.
- Identifying specific urge triggers.
- Rating each trigger on the Level of Urge scale.
- Using bilateral stimulation for trigger desensitization.
- Reconnecting the trigger with an adaptive resource state.
- Rehearsing healthier responses through future templates.
- Reviewing relapse experiences during later sessions.
DeTUR vs Standard EMDR Protocol
Both approaches use bilateral stimulation and careful treatment planning, but their immediate targets and measurements differ.
| Standard EMDR | DeTUR Protocol | |
| Main target | Distressing or traumatic memories | Triggers and urge states |
| Common focus | PTSD, negative beliefs, emotions, and body sensations | Addiction, cravings, relapse cues, and dysfunctional behaviors |
| Common starting point | Past memory targets | Present triggers and positive recovery goals |
| Main ratings | Subjective distress and belief validity | Level of Urge |
| Positive element | Installation of an adaptive belief | Positive state, anchor, and treatment goal |
| Time orientation | Past, present, and future | Mainly present and future, with past material addressed when it emerges |
| Main goal | Adaptive memory reprocessing | Trigger desensitization and urge reduction |
DeTUR does not replace basic EMDR assessment or standard trauma work. It changes where focused EMDR begins within addiction treatment.
DeTUR Protocol and the AIP Model
DeTUR is grounded in the Adaptive Information Processing model, which guides EMDR therapy.
The AIP model proposes that poorly processed experiences can continue shaping present emotions, beliefs, sensations, and behavior. DeTUR applies that idea to addiction by treating current triggers as links within a larger memory and coping network.
A trigger may connect with earlier trauma, shame, unmet emotional needs, craving memories, or learned relief. Reducing the urge matters, but the treatment plan may still need to address the experiences that gave the addictive behavior its original purpose.
What Happens During DeTUR Work?
DeTUR follows a structured sequence rather than applying eye movements whenever a client reports a craving.
- Complete clinical assessment: The therapist reviews substance use, behavioral patterns, trauma, safety, medications, withdrawal risks, relapses, and current supports.
- Build an internal resource: The client recalls feeling capable, calm, powerful, or in control. Bilateral stimulation strengthens that experience.
- Set a positive treatment goal: The client pictures a realistic future involving healthier coping, functioning, relationships, or recovery.
- Identify triggers: The therapist maps people, places, feelings, memories, routines, and physical sensations connected to the urge.
- Rate each urge: The client gives each trigger a Level of Urge score from 0 to 10.
- Process each trigger: Bilateral stimulation continues while the client notices the trigger, urge, body sensations, and emerging material.
- Install an adaptive response: The processed trigger is paired with the client’s positive state and chosen recovery goal.
- Run a future template: The client imagines facing that trigger successfully and processes any remaining blocks.
- Reevaluate later: New urges, relapse experiences, and unresolved trauma become possible targets during later sessions.
DeTUR Protocol for Addiction and Cravings
DeTUR is designed around the fact that cravings rarely appear without context. Internal and external triggers can quickly activate learned urge responses.
- Internal triggers: Shame, anxiety, anger, boredom, loneliness, stress, memories, and uncomfortable body sensations.
- External triggers: People, locations, routines, screens, money, substances, gambling cues, conflict, and social situations.
DeTUR may reduce the immediate pull attached to those cues. However, reducing an urge response is not the same as treating the full addiction picture.
A substance use disorder may also require detoxification, medication support, medical monitoring, behavioral treatment, family work, recovery groups, housing support, and relapse prevention.
DeTUR Protocol for Behavioral Addictions
DeTUR has also been applied to gambling, problematic internet use, gaming, shopping, compulsive sexual behavior, and other repetitive behaviors.
The direct research on DeTUR for behavioral addictions is still small. In a 2012 case study by Bae and Kim, one 13-year-old with internet addiction disorder completed four 45-minute DeTUR sessions. The authors reported improvement after treatment, but one case cannot show how well DeTUR works across broader populations.
A case series by Bae, Han, and Kim also examined DeTUR with four male inpatients receiving treatment for pathological gambling. Participants received DeTUR alongside a broader 10-week inpatient program, which makes the results harder to separate from other treatment effects. The findings were encouraging, but the authors still called for controlled research.
Benefits of the DeTUR Protocol
DeTUR gives therapists a clear way to organize addiction work around the moment an urge becomes active.
- It directly targets identifiable present-day triggers.
- It creates positive treatment goals instead of focusing only on stopping behavior.
- It may help reduce Level of Urge ratings for processed cues.
- It can reveal high-risk chains involving emotion, setting, memory, and behavior.
- It includes adaptive behavior rehearsal through future templates.
- It can support client empowerment through resource accessing.
- It may connect present urges with underlying trauma requiring further EMDR therapy.
- It fits naturally within relapse prevention and broader addiction recovery work.
Limitations and Clinical Cautions
The protocol-specific evidence base for DeTUR remains small.
- It is not a standalone cure for addiction.
- It does not replace detoxification or medical stabilization.
- Evidence comes mainly from case studies and small case series.
- Substance use disorders often require coordinated medical and behavioral care.
- Active suicidality, severe dissociation, withdrawal, or instability may require different first steps.
- Relapse planning, support systems, and medication treatment still matter.
- Trauma processing should not begin before readiness and stabilization are established.
- Clinicians need specialized training, consultation, and clear scope of practice.
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Broader EMDR research for substance use disorders is more developed than the evidence for DeTUR specifically. A 2023 meta-analysis by Logsdon, Cornelius-White, and Kanamori reviewed 10 studies involving 561 participants with substance use disorders. The analysis found moderate benefits across the included EMDR approaches, but those studies did not examine DeTUR alone. That distinction matters because broader EMDR findings should not be presented as direct proof of DeTUR effectiveness.
DeTUR Protocol vs Other EMDR Addiction Protocols
DeTUR is one of several EMDR protocols used in addiction work. Each starts with a different maintaining mechanism.
- DeTUR: Targets current triggers and the urges they activate.
- CravEx protocol: Processes craving memories, relapse episodes, and addiction memories.
- Feeling-State Addiction Protocol: Targets positive feelings linked to a substance or behavior.
- Standard EMDR: Processes underlying traumatic memories and negative beliefs.
- Relapse target work: Addresses earlier returns to use and the distress connected with them.
- Future templates: Rehearse adaptive responses to expected high-risk situations.
What Therapists Should Know Before Using DeTUR
EMDR training is only one part of safe DeTUR practice. Clinicians also need a working understanding of addiction assessment and recovery.
Before starting, the therapist should examine withdrawal risks, current use, readiness, dissociation, trauma history, relapse patterns, medication needs, and available supports. A licensed therapist should know when medical care, detoxification, or a higher treatment level comes before urge reprocessing.
The protocol should address triggers without ignoring why the substance or behavior became a coping tool in the first place. No specialized protocol guarantees successful treatment, especially when addiction, trauma, safety concerns, and social instability overlap.
Learn EMDR and Trauma-Informed Addiction Treatment Skills With Online CE Credits
Finding a protocol is easy. Knowing when it fits, how to sequence it, and when to stop requires deeper clinical training.
At Online CE Credits, our 5.25-CE addiction-focused EMDR home study course covers the DeTUR protocol, trigger desensitization, urge-related resourcing, the Positive Feeling State and positive treatment goal, relapse and stabilization work, and the move into EMDR trauma-based interventions.
Clinicians can also explore our broader EMDR CE course collection for training in trauma, anxiety, dissociation, complex cases, and protocol modifications.
Our 23-CE foundational certificate covers the original eight-phase model, AIP, safety, stabilization, and reprocessing. The 32-CE advanced program adds deeper work around complex trauma, addiction, anxiety, depression, children, and clinical modifications.
Both programs also include the option to pursue the related EMDRPT-I™ or EMDRPT-II™ credential through Mind Works Continuing Education, LLC, with the certification fee included at no extra cost.
FAQs
What is the DeTUR protocol in EMDR?
It is an EMDR-based protocol that desensitizes triggers and reduces urges connected with addictions, cravings, and dysfunctional behaviors.
What does DeTUR stand for?
DeTUR stands for Desensitization of Triggers and Urge Reprocessing.
Is DeTUR used for addiction?
Yes. It is commonly used with substance-related urges, relapse triggers, behavioral addictions, and repetitive dysfunctional behaviors.
Is DeTUR the same as standard EMDR?
No. Standard EMDR often begins with traumatic memories, while DeTUR commonly starts with present triggers and urge states.
Can DeTUR treat cravings?
It may reduce the intensity of urges connected to specific triggers. Broader addiction treatment and recovery support usually remain necessary.
Is DeTUR evidence-based?
The evidence is limited compared with standard EMDR for PTSD. Current support includes case studies, small case series, and broader EMDR addiction research.
Who can use the DeTUR protocol?
It should be used by clinicians with appropriate EMDR training, addiction-treatment knowledge, clinical assessment skills, and consultation when needed.
