Monday, July 13, 2009

In a Nutshell, What is CBT?

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is built on the pragmatic notion that what people think can and does affect how they feel and how they behave. It is a powerful, simple and self-evidently sensible idea. CBT is an evidence based wholistic model in the truest sense - it is about encouraging positive change across the whole self.

The origins of the cognitive-behavioural model of applied psychology can be traced back to the early operant conditioning work of Watson and Raynor (1920), and it was certainly informed if not hastened by the innovative Rational Emotive Therapy (RET) work of Dr Albert Ellis in the mid-1950's, but it was not until Dr Aaron Beck developed his approach called Cognitive Therapy in the 1960's that modern Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, as it is understood today, started to take a more identifiable shape.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy works by encouraging individuals to intentionally challenge the perceived ferocity, integrity and legitimacy of disempowering belief constructs; individuals are encouraged to look at negative beliefs and actively deconstruct them. Negative belief structures, for example, are rearranged, probed, prodded and dissected in the pursuit of ownership - thoughts are deemed to be "just thoughts" ultimately.

In a nutshell, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy seeks to help instil an empowering mindset over and above the self-limiting, helpless mindset and provide a set of coping skills to support cognitive-behavioural realignment where applicable. CBT is a science-based, short-term psychological model of change management that continues to evolve and grow in the light of the empirical evidence base that both informs and supports it. Change is a choice too, CBT reminds us.

Learn more to quit smoking

No comments:

Post a Comment