Cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy, what is it, who needs it. Methods and techniques of this type of practical psychology, help for depression. This practical method of psychotherapy has found wide application in the treatment of certain types of mental disorders, when it is necessary to help the patient to reconsider their views and behavioral attitudes, causing irreparable harm to health, destroying the family and causing suffering to loved ones.
It is effective, in particular, in the treatment of alcoholism and drug addiction, if, after drug therapy, the body is cleared of toxic poisoning. During the rehabilitation course, which takes 3-4 months, patients learn to cope with their destructive thinking and correct their behavioral attitudes. It's important to know! Cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy will be effective only when the patient wants it and establishes a trusting contact with the therapist.
Basic Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Methods of cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy proceed from the theoretical tasks of cognitive and behavioral (behavioral) therapy. The psychologist does not set himself the goal of getting to the roots of the problems that have arisen. Through proven techniques, applying specific techniques, he teaches positive thinking so that the patient's behavior changes for the better. During psychotherapeutic sessions, some of the methods of pedagogy and psychological counseling are also used. The most significant CBT techniques are:
- Cognitive therapy … If a person is insecure and perceives his life as a streak of failures, it is necessary to consolidate in his mind positive thoughts about himself, which should return him confidence in his abilities and the hope that everything will definitely work out for him.
- Rational emotive therapy … It is aimed at the patient's awareness of the fact that their thoughts and actions need to be coordinated with real life, and not hover in their dreams. This will protect you from the inevitable stress and teach you to make the right decisions in various life situations.
- Reciprocal inhibition … Inhibitors are substances that slow down the course of various processes, in our case we are talking about psychophysical reactions in the human body. Fear, for example, can be suppressed by anger. During the session, the patient can imagine that he can suppress his anxiety, for example, by complete relaxation. This leads to the extinction of the pathological phobia. Many of the special techniques of this method are based on this.
- Autogenic training and relaxation … Used as an adjunct to CBT sessions.
- Self-control … Based on the operant conditioning method. It is understood that the desired behavior in certain conditions should be fixed. It is relevant for difficulties in life situations, for example, study or work, when various kinds of addictions or neuroses arise. They help to raise self-esteem, control unmotivated outbursts of rage, extinguish neurotic manifestations.
- Introspection … Keeping a behavior diary is one way to "stop" to interrupt obsessive thoughts.
- Self-instructions … The patient must set himself tasks that must be adhered to in order to positively solve his problems.
- Stop-tap method or self-control triad … Internal "stop!" negative thoughts, relaxation, positive perception, mental reinforcement.
- Evaluating feelings … The "scaling" of feelings is carried out according to a 10-point or other system. This allows the patient to determine, for example, the level of his anxiety or, conversely, confidence, where on the "scale of feelings" they are. It helps to objectively assess your emotions and take steps to reduce (increase) their presence at the mental and sensory level.
- Investigation of threatening consequences or "what if" … Promotes the expansion of limited horizons. When asked "What if something terrible happens?" the patient should not overestimate the role of this "terrible", which leads to pessimism, but find an optimistic answer.
- Advantages and disadvantages … The patient, with the help of a psychologist, examines the advantages and disadvantages of his mental attitudes and finds ways of balancing their perception, this allows you to solve the problem.
- Paradoxical intention … The technique was developed by the Austrian psychiatrist Viktor Frankl. Its essence is that if a person is very afraid of something, he needs to return to this situation in his feelings. For example, a person suffers from a fear of insomnia, he needs to be advised not to try to sleep, but to stay awake as long as possible. And this urge to "stay awake" ultimately causes sleep.
- Anxiety Control Training … It is used in the event that a person in stressful situations cannot control himself, make a decision quickly.
Cognitive behavioral therapy techniques for treating neuroses
Cognitive behavioral therapy techniques include a wide variety of specific exercises with which the patient must solve his problems. Here are just a few:
- Reframing (English - frame) … With the help of special questions, the psychologist forces the client to change the negative "frames" of his thinking and behavior, to replace them with positive ones.
- Diary of thoughts … The patient records his thoughts to understand what is disturbing and affecting his thoughts and well-being during the day.
- Empirical verification … Includes several ways to help you find the right solution and forget negative thoughts and arguments.
- Examples of fiction … Clearly explain the choice of a positive judgment.
- Positive imagination … Helps get rid of negative perceptions.
- Role reversal … The patient imagines that he is comforting his comrade who finds himself in his position. Here's what he could advise him in this case?
- Flooding, implosion, paradoxical intention, provoked by anger … They are used when working with childhood phobias.
This also includes identifying alternative causes of behavior, as well as some other techniques.
Treating depression with cognitive behavioral therapy
Cognitive behavioral therapy for depression is widely used today. It is based on the cognitive therapy method of the American psychiatrist Aaron Beck. According to his definition, "depression is characterized by a globally pessimistic attitude of a person to his own person, the outside world and his future." This has a heavy effect on the psyche, not only the patient himself suffers, but also his relatives. Today, more than 20% of the population in developed countries suffers from depression. It significantly reduces the ability to work, and the likelihood of a suicidal outcome is high. There are many symptoms of a depressive state, they manifest themselves on the mental (dark thoughts, no concentration of attention, difficulty making decisions, etc.), emotional (melancholy, depressed mood, anxiety), physiological (sleep disturbance, loss of appetite, decreased sexuality) and behavioral (passivity, avoidance of contact, alcoholism or drug addiction as a temporary relief) level. If such symptoms are observed for at least 2 weeks, we can confidently talk about the development of depression. In some, the disease goes unnoticed, in others it becomes chronic and lasts for years. In severe cases, the patient is admitted to a hospital where he is being treated with antidepressants. After drug therapy, the help of a psychotherapist is needed, methods of psychodynamic, trance, existential psychotherapy are used. Cognitive-behavioral therapy for depression has proven its worth. All the symptoms of a depressive state are studied, and with the help of special exercises the patient can get rid of them. One of the most effective CBT techniques is cognitive remodeling. The patient, with the help of a psychotherapist, works with his negative thoughts, which are reflected in behavior, speaks them out loud, analyzes and, as necessary, changes his attitude to what was said. Thus, he makes sure that his values are true. The technique includes a number of techniques, the most common are the following exercises:
- Inoculation (grafting) of stress … Coping skills are taught to the patient to help cope with stress. First you need to understand the situation, then develop certain skills to deal with it, then you should consolidate them through certain exercises. The "inoculation" obtained in this way helps the patient to cope with strong experiences and disturbing events in his life.
- Suspension of thinking … A person is fixated on his irrational thoughts, they interfere with adequately perceiving reality, serve as a reason for the appearance of anxiety, as a result, a stressful situation arises. The psychotherapist invites the patient to reproduce them in his internal monologue, then loudly says: "Stop!" This verbal barrier abruptly cuts off the negative judgment process. This technique, repeated several times in the course of therapeutic sessions, develops a conditioned reflex to "wrong" ideas, the old stereotype of thinking is corrected, new attitudes to the rational type of judgments appear.
It's important to know! There is no treatment for depression that works for everyone. What works for one may not work at all for another. To find an acceptable method for yourself, you do not need to dwell on one only on the basis that it helped someone from your relatives or friends. How to treat depression with cognitive behavioral therapy - watch the video:
Cognitive behavioral therapy (psychotherapy) has proven to be effective in the treatment of various neuroses. If a person feels a discord in his soul associated with a negative assessment of himself, you need to contact a specialist who will help change the attitude (thoughts and behavior) towards yourself and the surrounding reality. After all, it is not without reason that it is sung: "Be tempered if you want to be healthy!" Such "hardening" from various neuroses, including depression, are the methods and techniques of CBT that are very popular these days.
