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Cognitive-Behavior Theory
Introduction to Cognitive-Behavior Theory (CBT)
Cognitive-behavior theory deals with micro practice or social work. Micro practice is one of the most common kinds of social work in which people interact with individuals or families to solve their problems. Cognitive structures are designed to work on the reaction and work of individuals in their personal lives as everyone has a unique cognitive structure that is based on individual experiences of life and biological predispositions. The hyphenated term “cognitive-behavioral” shows the significance of both cognitive aspects as well as behavioral approaches to understand and help human beings. Both of them have individual theoretical assumptions and intervention strategies.
Aaron Temkin Beck, a psychiatrist from America pioneered work on psychotherapy, psychometrics, and psychopathology, and founded the cognitive therapy (The Grawemeyer Awards, 2009). Beck was of opinion that without change in beliefs (schema), life cannot be improved. On the other hand, symptoms can be changed with beliefs; that is why it can be said that beliefs work as small operational units in changing someone’s life. In short, thoughts and beliefs influence behavior and other subsequent actions.
Positive thinking can help in getting positive results in the treatment of patients. At the same time negative thoughts are depressing in nature leading to undesired results in the treatment. Sometimes, thoughts come in mind that causes a shift or alteration in views about past events of life. In the life of some people, this cognitive variation becomes a hurdle and decreases their ability to reach the optimum level of functioning. On the other hand, some people get maximum benefits from this structure and utilize these thoughts for productive purposes.
Cognitive-behavior theory can improve life by developing a therapy known as cognitive-behavioral therapy (Dobson, & Dobson, 2009) that is affective in a number of disorders especially psychiatric disorders such as drug abuse, sadness, personality disorders etc., and psychological disorders such as compulsive shopping or gambling and uncontrollable anger. This therapy is also helpful in the treatment of certain medical problems having psychological basis such as obesity, chronic pain, pre-menstrual syndrome etc. Many therapists and healthcare experts use one or more components of the cognitive-behavioral therapy to treat their patients. Basic points of the cognitive theory are thinking, cognition, and behavioral change (Hepworth, Rooney, Rooney, Strom-Gottfried, & Larsen, 2009).
Thinking is considered as the primary determinant of cognitive-behavior theory as it helps in understanding the behavior. Cognitions are the psychological results of learning, perception, and reasoning. They are manifested in behavioral responses, which are function of the cognitive processes of attention, retention, motivation, and production, along with rewarding and unrewarding consequences. Cognitions that result in faulty thinking or cognitive distortions can be managed and altered. Behavioral change is related to making productive changes by concentrating on misconceptions, and the level to which they cause or contribute to problems. Cognitive-behavioral therapy shows that behavioral change can be done by changing thoughts.
In order to understand this therapy, let’s take the case of Jacky. She is a young African American girl, who was close to her mother and sister. During her childhood, she spent a lot of time alone with no one around and feeling very lonely. She was a clinging child and found it difficult to go to school. She faced some problems as she lost her mother and her sister moved away. She found sports to get attention in college life. Her work environment was probably not supporting her. Jacky felt some problems such as decreased motivation in life, decreased appetite and unexplained fatigue. These were the reasons Jacky needs to go to a counseling center or to see a social worker for cognitive-behavior Therapy to rewire her brain. One thing that was positive in her life was her desire to get better “on her own” but the negative thing was her thinking about her friends or family, who would think that she can’t handle things on her own.
Cognitive-behavior therapy can help her in removing disturbing thoughts and behaviors from her life. It is the combination of two different but complimentary approaches to psychotherapy, i.e. behavior therapy and cognitive therapy (Jokić-Begić, 2010). Behavior therapy works on the theory that problem-causing and disturbing behaviors can be unlearned while desired and productive behaviors can be learned. On the other hand, cognitive therapy deals with the alteration of disturbing patterns of thinking and emotional reactions and responses. With the help of cognitive therapy, she will be able to control all types of negative thoughts about her friends and family, and with the help of behavior therapy, she would be able to adopt herself according to changed thoughts and environment. With the help of cognitive therapy, Jackie’s thoughts about her family members and friends, and affects of those thoughts on her life can be improved. Cognitive behavioral therapy can help her in knowing that sharing her thoughts with others can help her in improving her life and spending time with people of the world could remove her loneliness.
Critique of the theory
This theory revolves around thought processes that are too complicated and abstract to understand completely. A person’s thought process is influenced by not only his or her own perceptions but also by the perceptions of other people in the surrounding. Similar is the case with Jackie, who felt lonely due to her perceptions of herself and other people in her surroundings. Although the person tries to change those thought patterns but negative thought patterns might reemerge unintentionally and probably this was the reason that Jackie felt fatigue and decreased motivation. Some critiques of the cognitive theory are as follows:
- This theory focuses mainly on the issues at individual level and has limited consideration of broader issues such as issues related to social justice.
- According to this theory, thoughts precede emotions, whereas in neuroscientific investigations, this point of view has not been supported as universal.
- This theory emphasizes on conscious thoughts but not on unconscious thoughts.
- Cognitive theory is not considered as a relationally focused theory.
- The practice model in this theory is highly structured as well as over-simplistic.
- Cognitive theory has restricted developmental perspective.
Among other important criticisms is the absence of ecological validity in which experts are of opinion that lab experiments for this theory cannot tell about the cognition in real world. Moreover, this theory has less focus on the individual differences. Some experts are of opinion that this theory doesn’t deal with cognitive abilities that are influenced by emotional state.
Conclusion
Cognitive-behavior theory has some strong points that are helpful in making it an important theory. It can significantly enhance the scope of potential interventions and gives better conception of conditions and situations by increasing the number of influence points on the people’s cognitions and behavior within a systemic context. This gives experts more flexibility by increasing the number of potential intervention approaches. People, whose behaviors are based on faulty logic and misconceptions, the responses of thinking, cognition, and behavioral change, can be valid. It has to be considered that cognitions are not necessarily responsible for faulty behavior but culture, sociopolitical issues and social interactions are also important factors in changing the behavior. Context and environment in which people live also play an important role in impacting people’s thinking and cognitions.
Two most important concepts from cognitive-behavior theory are cognition and behavioral change, and these concepts can also be applied to treat medical problem. In the case of Jackie, she also got thoughts of medical problem. She thought that she might get thyroid problem as this problem was running in her family. Jackie complained about fatigue, loss of appetite, and reduced motivation in her life. She went through examination at the student health services showing that she was free of the problem and her medical tests were negative. Cognitive-behavior theory can play an important role in the life of Jackie particularly two important parts or responses of this theory, which are cognition and behavioral change can help in improving the life. Jackie may have gone through various experiences in her life, but cognition and perception of those experiences and change of behavior according to the experiences can help in giving her a good quality of life. It is better for her to realize that in distress, perspectives are often inaccurate and thoughts can be unrealistic. However, solving problems through realistic thinking can help in feeling better.
References
Dobson, D., & Dobson, K. S. (2009). Evidence-Based Practice of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy: Guilford Publications.
Hepworth, D., Rooney, R., Rooney, G. D., Strom-Gottfried, K., & Larsen, J. A. (2009). Direct Social Work Practice: Theory and Skills: Cengage Learning.
Jokić-Begić, N. (2010). Cognitive-behavioral therapy and neuroscience: Towards closer integration. Psihologijske teme, 19(2), 235-254.
The Grawemeyer Awards (2009). 2004 - Aaron Beck. Retrieved from http://grawemeyer.org/psychology/previous-winners/2004-aaron-beck.html
