Cognitive behaviour therapy – West London Mental Health
Developed by Dr. Aaron T. Beck, Cognitive Therapy (CT), or Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), is a form of psychotherapy in which the therapist and the client work together, as a team, to identify and solve problems. Therapists use the Cognitive Model to help clients overcome their difficulties by changing their thinking, behaviour and emotional responses.
“Many people with psychological disorders, particularly depressive, anxiety and sexual disorders have been found to display maladaptive assumptions and thoughts (Beck et al., 1983)”.
Cognitive psychology focuses on the way humans process information, looking at how we treat information that comes in to the person and how this treatment leads to responses, studying internal processes including perception, attention, language, memory and thinking
“When experimental subjects are manipulated into adopting unpleasant assumptions or thought they became more anxious and depressed (Rimm & Litvak, 1969)”.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) can be used to care for and treat people with a wide range of problems that are associated with psychological and mental health issues. Some of the most commonly diagnosed forms of mental health problems are:
- Anxiety
- Bipolar disorder (formerly known as manic depression)
- Depression
- Eating disorders
- Obsessive-compulsive disorder
- Panic attacks
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Schizophrenia
- Self-harm
- Suicidal thoughts
CBT is based on the idea that we think (cognition), we feel (emotion) and we act (behaviour). They all interact together which means that negative and unrealistic thoughts can cause us distress and result in problems. Specifically, our thoughts determine our feelings and our behaviour. When a person suffers with psychological distress, the way in which they interpret situations becomes skewed, which in turn has a negative impact on the actions they take.
With an educational background encompassing all three of the following:
- Counselling – an opportunity to talk about what is troubling you and be heard
- Psychotherapy – aims to help you understand why you feel the way you do
- Cognitive behavioural therapy – aims to challenge negative thinking and behaviours
I can surely listen, examine and restore to health the cause of any individual’s complaints.
Ealing CBT
