Cognitive Behavior Therapy

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Cognitive Behavior Therapy

• By Missy Maiorano
• SPED 835
• Fall 2001

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Its All About The Thoughts and Experiences

• A man with multiple sclerosis, who believes that
  his ability to make a useful contribution to life
  is finished, is likely to experience depressed
  mood and avoidance of previously enjoyed
  activities. But, a different man with the same
  condition, who acknowledges that his life will
  have to change, but who believes that he will be
  able to discover new ways to make a contribution,
  is likely to make a better psychological
  adjustment to his illness.

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What Is Cognitive Behavior Therapy?

• Cognitive Behavior Therapy is a form of
  psychotherapy that focuses on changing a persons
  dysfunctional thoughts, emotions, or behaviors.

• CBT is a focused, structured, collaborative, and
  usually short-term therapy that aims to
  facilitate problem solving and to modify
  dysfunctional thinking and behavior.

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Cognitive VS Behavior Therapy

• Cognitive therapy teaches you how certain thought
  patterns are triggering your feelings, behaviors
  and symptoms.

• Behavior therapy helps you break the chains
  between difficult situations and your traditional
  reactions to them.

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Relationships

• In order for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to be
  effective, patients and therapists must establish
  collaborative relationships that connect
  themselves to the philosophy and central tenets
  of CBT.

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Stages of CBT

• Stage one focuses on self-monitoring and
  accompanying thoughts or feelings.
• Stage two examines thoughts, beliefs, and values
  as well as feelings and introducing cognitive
  restructuring and implementing specific
  techniques such as exposure and response
  prevention.
• Stage three focuses on discussing termination and
  maintenance of improvement.

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Who Benefits From CBT?

• Patients who are able to identify and
  differentiate emotions and behaviors, accept some
  responsibility toward addressing their problems,
  and accept the application of CBT to their
  problems and situations.

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Homework

• Patients are commonly asked to write down their
  feelings during the day outside of therapy.
  These feelings include positive and negative
  thoughts.

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Length of Therapy

• Most therapy session last for a few weeks and
  conclude in ten to twenty sessions if it is a
  short term problem.

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What CBT Is Used for

• Depression
• Self-Esteem
• Body-Image
• Interpersonal Maturity
• Social-Emotional Anxiety
• Eating Disorders
• Drug and Alcohol Addictions
• Just About Anything Imaginable

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Medications and CBT

• Prozac is still the most commonly prescribed
  antidepressant today.
• Pills are viewed as cheaper than therapy
  sessions.

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Medications and CBT Cont.

• Prescription drug therapies added no long term
  benefits to treatment and that CBT in itself
  showed the best long-term results.

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Final Tidbits

• CBT is quick, easy available anywhere, and, once
  you get the hang of it, free.
• This therapy teaches you how to retrain yourself
  to look at things a different way in order to
  help yourself.