History of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy first emerged around the 1960s by a psychiatrist named Aaron Beck. As common as this therapy is, it hasn’t been around vastly as much as the other therapies, but regardless has impacted a lot of individuals lives. Beck created this therapy after having many patients with negative internal dialogues. He believes these negative ideations stem from thinking patterns set up in childhood that become automatic and fixed. With these negative ideations often came negatively impacted emotions. He called this “automatic thoughts.

” Originally, this theory was strictly named cognitive therapy because its main focus was the patients thought processes but soon it adapted from that. Aaron Beck's extreme objective was to enable individuals to end up mindful of when they make negative translations, and of personal conduct standards which fortify the twisted reasoning. When we break down exactly what Cognitive-behavioral therapy is, we have to take it section by section.

Behavioral treatment has been around since the early 1900’s.

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Some popular psychologist we know who contributed to Behavioral therapy were Skinner, Pavlov, and Watson. Behaviorism is based on the idea that behaviors can be measured, taught and even changed. It is believed that our behavior is based on our responses to environmental stimuli. The principal wave of behavioral treatment happened during the 1940s in light of the passionate changes looked by the numerous WWII veterans coming back from war. Moving on, Cognitive therapy in the mid 1900s, is when Alfred Adler, Austrian psychotherapist generated the idea of fundamental oversights and their ability to create terrible feelings that made him one of the earliest advisors address insight in psychotherapy.

His work motivated an American analyst Albert Ellis to create emotive conduct treatment also known as Rational emotive behavior therapy during the 1950s. This is presently viewed as one of the most important contribution to psychological psychotherapy.

After learning the history of behavior, the history of cognition in general begins over two thousands years ago. Aristotle, the greek philosopher placed importance on making sure his studies and ideas were based on empirical evidence while being cautious with experimental research. Succeeding, Rene Descartes was a seventeenth-century philosopher who created the famous saying, I think, therefore I am. This means that the act of actually being able to think proves that a thinker exists. He came up with this idea when trying to prove whether anyone could really know anything regardless of the fact that our senses can and have lid to us. Wilhelm Wundt is considered one of the biggest figures in modern psychology. He believed in the analysis of the contents of one’s own mind and experience. Even though today Wilhelm Wundt’s methods are recognized as being unreliable, he is a main part in the development of cognition because of his examination on human thought processes. The word cognition can primarily mean our thoughts but when used in psychology, “cognition” usually refers to processing of neural information, but if you were to be talking about cognition in social psychology the term it would refer to attitudes and group attributes. These many approaches to cognition evaluation are referenced in the fairly recent field of cognitive science, collaborative study of cognitive abilities and domains.

To continue, a theory is not a theory without notion. An assumption common in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is that cognitions are not simply mysterious short-lived processes, they can be measured, monitored, and changed. Asking people how they think and feel is a potentially effective way to understand their behavior. If cognitions can be measured they can also be refined. This means that the way that people think about the world and think about themselves can be changed, which is the ultimate goal of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy when there is maladaptive behavior and cognitions. Some interventions common in Cognitive Behavioral therapy is learning coping mechanisms to manage stress and anxiety, for example, relaxation techniques such as deep breathing in through the nose out of the mouth, coping self-talk such as “I’ve done this before,there is nothing to be scared of.” Affirming actions and thoughts help counteract the negative emotions you’re feeling.

In retrospect, Pleasant activity scheduling is an effective Cognitive Behavioral Therapy technique. It has been seen to help majorly in depression over all other disorders Cognitive behavioral therapy treats. An example of pleasant activity scheduling is, say you’ve been in this funk that you are having trouble getting out of, a therapist who specializes in CBT could recommend, writing the next seven days down on a piece of paper, just to start off and see if the client is able to complete it, starting with the day we are on.