Aaron Beck’s Cognitive Therapy

We analyze one of the most relevant theoretical bodies in psychological therapy.

The cognitive psychology is a branch of psychology that deals with the processes through which the individual obtains knowledge of the world and becomes aware of his environment, as well as its results.

Cognitive models pay special attention to cognitions, understood in a broad sense as ideas, personal constructs, beliefs, images, attributions of sense or meaning, expectations... and therefore and therefore studies basic processes such as memory, attention, concept formation, information processing, conflict resolution, etc.etc.

Cognitive Psychology and Cognitive Therapy in Context

Modern cognitive psychology has been shaped under the influence of related disciplines, such as information processing, artificial intelligence and language science. But this branch of psychology is not only an experimental approach, but has been put into practice in various fields: learning, social psychology or psychotherapy. The latter is called cognitive therapy.

It is important to differentiate between cognitive psychology y cognitive psychotherapyAlthough the two are related, the most prominent authors of cognitive psychology made their main developments far from psychotherapeutic centers. Instead, cognitive psychotherapy designed specific methods (treatments) from some developments in cognitive psychology (cognitive science), as clinical researchers soon saw the usefulness of these principles when applied to different people with different problems to improve their quality of life, solve human problems and treat mental disorders.

Pioneers in cognitive therapy: Aaron Beck and Albert Ellis

The pioneers in using the bases of cognitive science in a systematic way for the treatment of psychological disorders were the psychologists Albert Ellis y Aaron Beck. The former called his model of therapeutic application "Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy" (REBT) and the latter called his method of therapy "Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy" (REBT) and the latter called his method of therapy "Cognitive Cognitive Cognitive Therapy" (CCT).Cognitive Therapy”.

It is important to note that there are different models of cognitive therapy, and these are two of the best known because of their great practical utility. Cognitive therapies are not "techniques", but applied science. applied scienceTherefore, they usually consist of a more or less defined method to achieve certain objectives according to their theoretical approach.

Aaron Beck's model is basically focused on automatic thoughts and cognitive distortions, and Albert Ellis' Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy is mainly focused on irrational beliefs. There are similarities between the two, but also differences, for example: Beck's Cognitive Therapy is based on collaborative empiricism; on the other hand, Ellis uses dialogue or Socratic debate as his main therapeutic tool..

Aaron Beck's Cognitive Therapy

The main idea of Cognitive Therapy is that people suffer because of their interpretation of events and not because of the events themselves.. Therefore, Aaron Beck, interested in the treatment of depression, developed a model for the treatment of this pathology that he later extended to other disorders.

Beck's model, and also that of Ellis, are an important part of the strategies used in cognitive-behavioral therapy. because, through cognitive cognitive restructuringThrough cognitive restructuring, an individual is able to modify the way he/she interprets and subjectively evaluates the facts and situations he/she experiences, thus stimulating him/her to alter disordered thought patterns and to see him/herself and the world in a more realistic and adaptive way.

These types of cognitive (or cognitive-behavioral) therapies are called "relational or cognitive restructuring therapies", but there are also other types of cognitive therapies such as: coping and management skills training therapies or problem-solving therapies.

Cognitive organization according to Beck's model

The model proposed by Beck states that individuals do not respond automatically to a situation, but before making an emotional or behavioral response, they perceive, classify, interpret, evaluate, and assign meaning to the stimulus based on their previous assumptions o cognitive schemas (also called core beliefs).

Cognitive schemas

In Beck's theory, cCognitive processes are the mechanisms of encoding, storing and retrieving information in cognitive structures. (schemas). Therefore, the following are included among the cognitive processes: perception, attention, memory and interpretation. In the processing of information, errors can occur in any of its phases that result in an alteration or distortion in the assessment and interpretation of the facts, which the author calls "cognitive distortions".

The cognitive structures of information organization in the memory are the following schemaswhich represent the set of previous experiences and act as molds that direct attention, influence the interpretation of events and facilitate memory.

For Beck, "schemas are stable cognitive patterns that form the basis for the regularity of interpretations of reality. People use their schemas to locate, encode, differentiate, and attribute meanings to data in the world." In other words, Schemas are subjective mental constructs, more or less stable, that act as filters for the individual's perception of the world..

Schemas come largely from previous learning experiences (generally early) and may remain latent until they are activated by a significant event that interacts with them. This is one of the most important concepts contributed by cognitive psychology, and although it was originally introduced by Frederick Bartlett to refer to memory-related processes in the social context, and was also used, among others, by Jean Piaget in the educational field, Beck (together with Ellis) introduced it in the psychotherapeutic field.

Beliefs

The beliefs are the contents of schemas, and are the direct result of the relationship between reality and schemas. They are everything in which one believes, they are like internal maps that allow us to make sense of the world, are constructed and generalized through experience..

Beck distinguishes two types of beliefs:

• Core or nuclear beliefs.They are presented as absolute, enduring and global propositions about oneself, others or the world. For example, "I am incompetent". They represent the deepest cognitive level, are difficult to change, give the sense of identity and are idiosyncratic.

• Peripheral beliefsThey are influenced by the nuclear ones, therefore, they are located between them and the cognitive products or automatic thoughts. They consist of attitudes, rules and presumptions (or assumptions). Therefore, they influence the way of seeing the situation, and that vision influences how an individual feels, acts or thinks.

Cognitive products

The cognitive products refer to thoughts and images resulting from the interaction of situational information, schemas and beliefs, and cognitive processes.. The contents of cognitive products are usually more easily accessible to consciousness than schemas and cognitive processes.

Beck's explanatory model of depression

For Beck, psychological disorders derive from cognitive distortions (errors in cognitive processes), which are mistaken ways of thinking that appear in the form of automatic thoughts (cognitive products) in certain situations, and which cause negative emotional states and inappropriate behaviors. Therefore, these cognitive distortions are caused by these cognitive distortions are caused by irrational beliefs or personal assumptions learned in the past, which unconsciously condition the way we think.which unconsciously condition the perception and interpretation of the past, present and future.

People suffering from depression become vulnerable to certain situations, and it is important to understand that this theory does not suggest that cognitions are the cause of depression or any other emotional disorder; what is really postulated is the primacy of the symptoms: the activation of negative schemas and the consequent cognitive distortions would be the first link in the chain of depressive symptoms.

The cognitive triad in people with depression

When a person is confronted with a given situation, the schema is the basis for transforming data into cognitions. Since the schemas that are activated in a given situation will determine how that person responds, in people with a depressive disorder inappropriate schemas will be activated.

Therefore, the first depressive symptom the first depressive symptom is the activation of cognitive schemas related to the view of oneself, the world and the future.. People with negative schemas or a tendency to make processing errors will be more prone to depressive disorders.

The cognitive triad refers to three characteristic schemas that induce the depressed individual to perceive himself, the world and the future from a negative point of view. From these three cognitive patterns derive the rest of the depressive symptoms suffered.

The characteristic pattern suffered by depressed people, which Beck calls the depressive triad, consists of a negative view of:

• SelfSelf: people suffering from depression tend to see themselves as deficient and useless. They attribute the mistakes they make to a physical, mental or moral defect of their own, and think that others will reject them.

• Of the worldThey feel socially defeated and are not up to the demands, nor do they have the ability to overcome obstacles.

• Of the futureThe person suffering from depression thinks that this situation cannot be modified, so it will always remain this way.

Cognitive distortions

The negative schemas activated in depressive individuals lead them to make a series of errors in the processing of information that facilitate biases and allow the depressive to maintain the biases and allow the depressive to maintain the validity of their beliefs. Beck listed a series of cognitive distortions, they are as follows:

• Selective abstraction.Selective abstraction: this involves paying attention to only one aspect or detail of the situation. Positive aspects are usually ignored, giving more importance to the negative aspects.

• Dichotomous thinkingEvents are evaluated in an extreme way: good/bad, black/white, all/nothing, etc.

• Arbitrary inference: consists of drawing conclusions from a situation that are not supported by the facts, even when the evidence is contrary to the conclusion.

• Overgeneralization: it consists in drawing a general conclusion from a particular fact without sufficient basis.

• Magnification and Minimizationtendency to exaggerate the negative aspects of a situation, an event or one's own quality and to minimize the positive.

• Personalizationrefers to the habit of relating the facts of the environment to oneself, showing oneself to be susceptible.

• Catastrophic visionanticipating events and, among the different options, thinking that the worst is always going to happen.

• You shouldshould: consists of maintaining rigid and demanding rules about how things should happen.

• Global labelsconsists of putting global labels on ourselves or others without taking into account other nuances.

• Blameconsists of attributing to oneself or others all responsibility for events, ignoring other contributing factors.

Automatic thoughts

Therefore, when these characteristic schemas of depressive people are activated, the cognitive products will be maladaptive and negative, the cognitive products will be maladaptive and negative..

The automatic thoughts are the internal dialogues, thoughts or images that appear in a given situation, and patients usually consider them to be undistorted true statements. These show a number of characteristics and are as follows:

• They are specific messages or propositions referring to a specific situation.

• They will always be believed, regardless of whether they are irrational or not.

• They are learned

• They enter spontaneously into the consciousness, dramatizing and exaggerating the negative aspects of the situation.

• They are not easy to detect or control, as they appear in the flow of the internal dialogue.