Tony has thoughts about hating his younger brother and wishing he would die. He becomes very anxious about these thoughts because he has developed the idea that if anything really happened to his brother, it would be his fault. For no explainable reason, Tony starts mentally counting by odd numbers each time he walks past his brother’s room and discovers that this activity makes him less anxious. Tony’s behavior can be described as

Obsessive-compulsive disorder is characterized by unreasonable thoughts and fears (obsessions) that lead to compulsive behaviors, which Tony shows signs of.

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annyksl annyksl · Answer 2 · 2019-10-15T16:23:40+02:00

Answer:

a mental compulsion developed to neutralize his bad thoughts.

Explanation:

Tony has bad thoughts that make him nervous and understands that he needs to stop thinking about these things. He has realized that mentally counting odd numbers each time he passes his brother's room, as this activity lessens the incidence of bad thoughts, Tony repeats the activity several times during the day. Tony developed a mental compulsion.

Compulsion is a repetitive, excessive activity and meaningless mental exercise that a person performs in an attempt to avoid distress, thoughts or worry. It is behavior designed to reduce psychic discomfort due to factors such as depression or anxiety.