Therapy, Clarified

We all talk to ourselves—but what if that inner voice is making life harder than it needs to be? Cognitive Behavioral Therapy teaches you how to recognize unhelpful thoughts and replace them with more balanced ones.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)  is based on the premise of the cognitive triangle  that our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors are all intertwined.  Before reflecting on how our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors are intertwined, we must note a specific triggering event so that we can  explore what thoughts ( specifically- automatic negative thoughts that occurred) and their relationship to how we feel and how we responded to both the emotions and behaviors.  One must go back further to the deeper assumptions of the CBT model. Goldberg & Goldberg (1991)  assert that the main assumptions include that all behaviors are learned and are nonhelpful strategies for managing behaviors, concentrates on here and now, and new behaviors can be learned. Further they asserted that  there was no need to explore the circumstance of the behaviors (Goldberg & Goldberg, 1991).

It is important to note that CBT is focused on changing the negative core beliefs or thoughts about oneself or situation (Gonzalez-Prendes & Resko, 2011, p14). Often therapists employing the CBT model will use  the cognitive triangle, thought tracking,  thought restructuring,  and values and belief exploration.  Thought tracking is used first to help note automatic negative self-thought or repetitive negative thoughts which is the basis of many mental disorders (Andrews-Hanna et al, 2022). Exploring negative thoughts and how they tie to beliefs about self allows the client to begin to understand how the core belief affects values.  Hanson (2022) notes there is importance to the perception of the client related to the origin of the negative thoughts. It is the clinician’s goal to assist the client with noting what events led to the negative thought. The clinician can then work collaboratively with the client to trace the thought back to when they first experienced it.

The process of tracing the thought back and connecting it to trauma as well as a core belief such as “I’m no good” or “I can’t do anything right”. Once the core belief is noted the therapist can collaborate with the client to determine how the current trigger for the negative thought reinforces the core belief.

Resources:

Andrews-Hanna, J. R., Woo, C. W., Wilcox, R., Eisenbarth, H., Kim, B., Han, J., … & Wager, T. D. (2022). The conceptual building blocks of everyday thought: Tracking the emergence and dynamics of ruminative and nonruminative thinking. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 151(3), 628.

Goldberg, I. & Goldberg, H. (1991). Family therapy: An overview. Brooks/Cole.

Gonzalez- Prendes, A.A. & Resko, S.M. (2011) Cognitive-behavioral therapy in  S. Ringel & J. Brandell (Eds.), Trauma: Contemporary directions in theory, practice and research (pp14-40). Sage Publications

Hanson, S. (2022). Institutional Investors In The Market For Single-Family Housing: Where Did They Come From, Where Did They Go? SSRN Electronic Journal, 44(11). https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4268640