Cognitive Behavioral Therapies

Many people do not understand what is meant by cognitive therapy. Here are some definitions.

Key Concepts

  1. Cognition. The act or process of knowing, perception, something known or perceived.
  2. Cognitive. Pertaining to cognition, pertaining to the mental processes of perception, memory, judgment, and reasoning, as contrasted with emotional and volitional processes.
  3. Cognitive dissonance. Anxiety that results from simultaneously holding contradictory or incompatible attitudes, beliefs, or the like. For example when one likes a person but disapproves of one of his/ her habits.
  4. Cognitive therapy. A form of psychotherapy that emphasizes the correction of distorted thinking associated with faulty self-perception and unrealistic expectations.

The pioneers of cognitive behavioral therapies such as Beck’s cognitive therapy and Ellis’s rational – emotive therapy were motivated by a growing dissatisfaction with the apparent limitations of behavioral and psychodynamic models, and an increasing interest in the role that cognitive factors play in shaping human behavior. The therapies and techniques referred to as “cognitive” or “cognitive- behavioral” differ in important ways but share several assumptions including:

  • People respond to cognitive representations of events rather than to the events themselves
  • Learning is cognitively mediated
  • Cognition mediates emotional and behavioral dysfunctions
  • At least some types of cognition can be monitored and modified
  • Modifying cognitions can change dysfunctional emotions and behaviors; and
  • Behavioral and cognitive techniques are both useful and can be integrated.

Cognitive therapies are active, structured, time-limited, and include both verbal procedures and behavioral techniques. These techniques are used to help clients identify, test the reality of, and then modify their distorted cognitions and the habitual dysfunctional beliefs that underlie their cognitions. These therapies provide a useful system for evaluating and resolving problems that are the result of clients’ mistaken beliefs and patterns of thought that often mediate a person’s dysfunctional emotional and behavioral patterns.

Goals

  • Identify and correct the client’s distorted negative cognitions;
  • Correct client’s negative cognitions and teach the client to do the same;
  • Clarify and challenge the client’s underlying cognitive schemata; and
  • Increase the client’s adaptive problem-solving skills.

Indications and Counter-indications

Indicators:

  • Mood disorders.
  • Relationship problems.
  • Fear of failure.
  • Feelings of rejection.
  • Anxiety, Phobias, OCD.
  • May be effective for eating disorders.
  • Works well with both children and adults.

Counter-Indicators:

  • Not effective for severe psychotic disorders.
  • Manic phase of bi-polar 1.
  • Discipline homework assignments may be difficult for some clients.
  • Does not address subconscious attitudes and feelings.