The stress-inoculation paradigm for helping clients deal with pain consists of education about the psychological dimensions of pain, training in a number of coping skills relevant to each dimension, and practice in applying these skills to the noxious stimulus. Presented are two studies, the first of which represents a component analysis of stress inoculation, and the second, an enhancement of the generalization potential of the paradigm and an exploration of the effect of procedural variations in the exposure component. Additional studies, currently in progress, are also described. (Author/CKJ)