Cognitive Therapy Treatment For Depression
Is cognitive therapy an effective treatment for depression
? Some studies have shown that it is at least as effective in treating mild or moderate cases of depression as medication. But, how exactly does it work?
Cognitive therapy is a process that enables a patient to control or discard negative thoughts and feelings that can lead to a depressed emotional state. Most everyone falls into a bad mood from time to time, and negative thoughts can lead to those bad moods. In the case of people who suffer from depression, however, these thoughts can be quite dark, and result in the person sinking into a much more depressed emotional state that is very difficult to escape without treatment.
Cognitive therapy provides the patient with the means in which to combat the negative thoughts and feelings that can result in a depressed mood. The fundamental thought behind this technique is that thought leads to mood. As such, training the patient how to replace negative thoughts with more positive and healthy thoughts will help them avoid depressed moods.
Cognitive therapy is a relatively recent type of treatment for depression. While Sigmund Freud touched on the idea that depression could occur in response to imaginary or perceived loss, it was not until the 1970's that psychologists began to writing about the cognitive aspects of depression. These therapists then began to identify cognitive components of depression and began to develop cognitive therapies to help treat the condition. Since then, the employment of this type of therapy has increased significantly as a treatment for depression.
When cognitive therapy is applied, the patient goes through several procedures. The first step is that the patient learns to accept that some of their perceptions of reality are false and that these false interpretations can lead to negative thoughts. These perceptions, or interpretations may be a result of past traumatic experience, a hereditary issue or some biological condition. The patient then learns to identify these negative thoughts when they appear and learns alternatives that provide a better interpretation of reality. Next, the patient makes a decision as to whether their own negative thought or the alternative thought is closer to reality and then they will learn to reconsider the situation from the alternative point of view.
The bottom line is that in practice, cognitive behavior therapy teaches the patient to replace negative thoughts with more positive thoughts. Scheduling pleasurable activities is a way of providing positive reinforcement.
Here is a list of some of the steps involved in cognitive therapy in a bit more detail
Self-Evaluation - Self-evaluation is an ongoing process where we evaluate how we handle typical tasks in life and whether we are doing and saying the right things and acting the right way. Depressed people tend to take responsibility for everything that goes wrong, and rarely take credit for things that work out well. They are too self-critical and have low self-esteem.
Identify Skill Deficits - Therapists will help their patient identify their social skill weaknesses, and provide them with the means of developing a plan to improve upon those skills.
Evaluate Life Experiences - The patient will evaluate their life experiences to determine those experiences that have led to their feelings of low self-esteem and negativity. The patient will also learn to evaluate some experiences in a more positive light. Depressed people tend to focus on the negative aspects of all experiences, rather than the positive.
Identify pessimistic thinking, irrational thoughts and beliefs, negative over generalization, and automatic negative thoughts.
Cognitive therapy has been shown to work as well as antidepressants alone to treat mild to moderate depression. In fact, it can work as quickly and as thoroughly, and work better in the long run. Cognitive therapy also works just as well as medication in preventing relapses and helps to reduce residual symptoms of depression after the completion of treatment through use of medication.
With all this in mind it is clear that cognitive therapy is quite effective in the treatment of depression in individuals who are viewed as mild or moderate cases. In more severe cases, it is also being used in combination with medication, and as a follow up treatment. Therefore, if an individual determines they may be suffering from depression, or if a family member or friend suspects this is the case, one of the first steps should be to find a qualified therapist who is experienced in cognitive behavioral therapy.
by: Scott Connor
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