Cognitive Therapy Article Index for
Cognitive
Website Links For
Cognitive
 

Information About

Cognitive Therapy




This article is about Beck's Cognitive Therapy. For the main category of psychotherapy, see Cognitive Behavioural Therapy .


Cognitive Therapy (CT) is a type of 2000 Albert Ellis was working on similar ideas from a different perspective, in developing his Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT). Beck initially focused on Depression and developed a list of "errors" in thinking that he proposed could cause or maintain depression, including Arbitrary Inference , Selective Abstraction , Over-generalization , and magnification (of negatives) and minimization (of positives). Cognitive therapy seeks to identify and change "distorted" or "unrealistic" ways of thinking, and therefore to influence emotion and behaviour.

Beck outlined his approach in ''Depression: Causes and Treatment'' in 1967 . He later expanded his focus to include anxiety disorders, in ''Cognitive Therapy and the Emotional Disorders'' in 1976, and other disorders and problems. "An Application of Beck's Cognitive Therapy to General Anger Reduction" - Abstract of paper published in ''Cognitive Therapy and Research'' Volume 24, Number 6, December 2000, pp. 689-697(9) He also introduced a focus on the underlying "schema"—the fundamental underlying ways in which people process information—whether about the self, the world or the future. Treatment is based on collaboration between client and therapist and on testing beliefs.

The new cognitive approach came into conflict with the Behaviourism ascendant at the time, which denied that talk of mental causes was scientific or meaningful, rather than simply assessing stimuli and behavioural responses. However, the 1970s saw a general "cognitive revolution" in psychology. Behaviour al modification techniques and cognitive therapy techniques became joined together, giving rise to Cognitive Behavioural Therapy . The term is sometimes used interchangeably with cognitive therapy, since cognitive therapy has always included some behavioural components, but advocates of Beck's particular approach seek to maintain and establish its integrity as a distinct clearly-standardized kind of cognitive behavioural therapy. Why Distinguish Between Cognitive Therapy and Cognitive Behaviour Therapy - The Beck Institute ''Newsletter'', February 2001


SEE ALSO



REFERENCES



EXTERNAL LINKS