Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Essay PDF

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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Etiology and Treatment

Psychology 10: Abnormal Psychology Professor Jennifer Dawgert-Carlin March 5, 2018

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is when our cognition, behaviors, and emotions come together to affect our style of life. Our distorted thoughts and maladaptive behaviors can lead to mental disorders. CBT is the combination of cognitive and behavioral therapists which is broken up into two categories: Cognitive therapy and Behavioral therapy. ETIOLOGY: Cognitive therapy focuses on how our dysfunctional thinkings and cognitive distortions leads to mental disorders (Dawgert-Carlin). When we have negative thoughts, it can lead to distress. For some people, when they adopt attitudes or make assumptions that are both disturbing and inaccurate, it might lead to abnormal cognitive functioning. One cognitive psychotherapist Aaron Beck believed that the way an individual reacts to the disturbing thoughts may cause abnormality. The distressing thoughts that enter our heads are known as automatic thoughts (Beck). The individual becomes unaware of developing these interpretations they make of themselves and of other people. This is because the automatic thoughts takes inaccurate realities and generalizes it as the self and identity. Another psychologist, Dr. Albert Ellis said that the main cause of abnormal functioning is irrational beliefs. In his ABC model, with A being the actuating event , B being the beliefs and C being the consequence it shows us how our beliefs can influence our behaviors towards the situation which might affect our chances of happiness and success (McLeod). There are usually two beliefs , the first one is usually a logical belief and the second one would be the anxiety provoking belief which then causes a person to experience distress. The second half to Cognitive Behavioral Theory is Behavioral therapy where we introduce Psychologists Ivan Pavlov, B.F. Skinner, and Albert Bandura. Behavioral therapy also assumes that all our behaviors are learned from the environment and are acquired through classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and modeling. However, when learning is defective, this leads to abnormal behavior. Behavioral therapists tend to place a heavy focus on current problems and behaviors that the patients find disturbing (McLeod). In Ivan Pavlov’s theory of classical conditioning, he experimented with a dog to understand how learning occurs. Classical conditioning is the process of learning in which two events involving an unconditioned stimulus (US) and neutral stimulus (NS) that repeatedly occur closely in time become embedded in a person’s mind and produces a conditioned response (CR). Unfortunately for us, this means that abnormal behaviors like phobias could also be learned and reinforced through classical conditioning. Along with Pavlov, B.F. Skinner focused on operant conditioning which looked at the cause of actions and how consequences can change our behavior (McLeod). Skinner believed that our actions were intentional and that we choose how we wanted to respond to the environment. Our response is influenced by the way we are reinforced by the environment. However, our response also depends on whether we receive rewards or punishments. Skinner called his rewards reinforcements, which increased the probability of the behavior being repeated again. According to Skinner, reinforcers is the response and actions we receive from our environment which could lead to the continuation of that behavior. Social Learning Theory (Albert Bandura), theorized that learning occurs through both classical conditioning and operant conditioning but he also emphasized the importance of learning through observing

others, also known as modeling. In his famous bobo doll experiment, groups of children were to pay attention to some people which were the models of the experiment and later, they may imitate the behavior that they have observed. He found that people mostly imitate the behaviors of models of the same gender which they identify as and also models which they perceive are similar to themselves. Bandura’s work of modeling shows us how any maladaptive observable behaviors could easily be modeled, observed and then learned plus also being reinforced or extinct through the rewards and punishment system (Fritscher). TREATMENT: Beck treated his patients by correcting inaccurate information processings, revise dysfunctional beliefs, and to control our behaviors and emotions. Secondly, he challenged and taught his patients to recognize, evaluate, and change the automatic thoughts. Automatic thoughts help remove and replace new rational thoughts to improve our behavior and emotions. Beck guided his clients to alter their dysfunctional thinking , thoughts and to try out new interpretations and find alternative ways of thinking in their daily lives (McLeod). Ellis used the treatment known as Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, which mainly focuses on solving emotional and behavioral problems by identifying irrational beliefs. REBT teaches someone to notice that some of our thoughts are dysfunctional and it also helps us be aware that we are having a first thought so that we can change the second anxiety provoking thought by reframing or re-interpreting it in a more realistic way. Pavlov’s treated his patients by identifying the behaviors that are causing a person’s problems and then try to replace them with more appropriate ones by applying the principles of classical conditioning. The treatment is widely known as systematic desensitization where clients are taught to react more calmly instead of with the intense fear that they’d normally experience when coming in contact with the objects or situations which they dread. Therapists use the same classical conditioning which we previously learned the maladaptive behaviors to learn more adaptive behaviors. Systematic desensitization is generally used to help and treat people with phobias. Skinner called his rewards reinforcements, which increased the probability of the behavior being repeated again. He had two types of reinforcers, positive and negative. In positive reinforcements, we add a positive trait to increase the behavior. In negative reinforcement, we take away something negative to increase behavior. Skinner also believed in punishments which are used when we want to decrease a behavior. However, punishments do not stop a behavior permanently, they only decrease the behavior temporarily when the punishment is present (Dawgert-Carlin). Bandura’s treatment involves modeling as a way of illustrating healthier behaviors which leads the client to observe and learn those behaviors. Behavior modeling is used to effectively treat various disorders such as phobias, PTSD, attention deficit disorder and eating disorders. Unfortunately, behavior modeling alone is unable to sustain long-term changes in behavior so it is paired up with role-play and reinforcement such as rewards to improve the effectiveness of the overall treatment (Fritscher). For example, when the patient witnesses the model reacting calmly to the phobia rather than feeling intense fear, the patient has a framework for imitating that response. The patient would hopefully then transfer that behavior into their real life situations.

In essence, cognitive behavioral therapy focuses on how distorted thoughts and maladaptive behaviors can lead to mental illnesses. Distorted thoughts is a form of automatic thought that is treated through reframing and REBT. Maladaptive behaviors are learned and reinforced from our environment, they are treated through classical conditioning, reinforcers and punishment and modeling.

Works Cited McLeod, Saul. “Saul McLeod.” B.F. Skinner | Operant Conditioning | Simply Psychology, 1 Jan. 1970, www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html.

McLeod, Saul. “Saul McLeod.” CBT | Simply Psychology, 1 Jan. 1970, www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-therapy.html. McLeod, Saul. “Saul McLeod.” Simply Psychology, 1 Jan. 1970, www.simplypsychology.org/behavioral-therapy.html. Lisa Fritscher | Reviewed by Steven Gans, MD. “How to Overcome Your Phobia Through Behavior Modeling.” Verywell Mind, www.verywellmind.com/behavior-modeling-2671528. McLeod, Saul. “Saul McLeod.” Simply Psychology, 1 Jan. 1970, www.simplypsychology.org/classical-conditioning.html. M Kathleen Homes, M.S. “Aaron Beck, Albert Ellis and Cognitive Psychology.” Psychology.info http://psychology.info/aaron-beck-albert-ellis-and-cognitive-psychology/ “Automatic Thoughts in CBT” Beck Institute for Cognitive Behavior Therapy https://beckinstitute.org/automatic-thoughts-in-cbt/ Josiah P. Allen. “An Overview of Beck’s Cognitive Theory of Depression in Contemporary Literature.” Rochester Institute of Technology. Personality Research http://www.personalityresearch.org/papers/allen.html Dawgert-Carlin, Jennifer. “Lecture: Theories of Etiology in Psychological Disorders.” Abnormal Psychology, Psych 10. CCSF, 5 Feb 2018...