CBT

CBT Definition of Cognitive Distortions

"Inaccurate thoughts that reinforce negative thought patterns or emotions." Faulty ways of thiking that convince us of a reality that is simply not true.

Overgeneralization

Assuming all experiences and people are the same, baaed on one negative experience. ". . . Taking a single incident or point in time and using it as the sole piece of evidence for a broad general conclusion. For example, a person may be on the lookout for a job but have a bad interview experience, but instead of brushing it off as one bad interview and trying again, they conclude that they are terrible at interviewing and will never get a job offer."

Catastrophizing / Magnifying or Minimizing

Assuming the worst case scenario, magnifying the negative and minimizing the positive. "This distortion involves expectations that the worst will happen or has happened, based on a slight incident that is nowhere near the tragedy that it is made out to be. For example, you may make a small mistake at work and be convinced that it will ruin the project you are working on, your boss will be furious, and you will lose your job. Alternatively, we may minimize the importance of positive things, such as an accomplishment at work or a desirable personal characteristic."

Unraveling Cognitive Distortions

Become aware of the distortions you are likely to be vulnerable of. "This is a main goal of CBT and can be practiced with or without the help of a therapist. In order to unravel the cognitive distortions you hold, you must first become aware of which Distortions you are most vulnerable to. Part of this involves identifying and challenging our harmful automatic thoughts, which frequently fall into one of the categories listed earlier."

Jumping to Conclusions

Being convinced of something with little to no evidence to support it. "Similar to overgeneralization, this distortion involves faulty reasoning in how we make conclusions. Instead of overgeneralizing one incident, however, jumping to conclusions refers to the tendency to be sure of something without any evidence at all. We may be convinced that someone dislikes us with only the flimsiest of proof, or we may be convinced that our fears will come true before we have a chance to find out."

Fallacy of fairness

Being too concerned over whether everything is fair. "We are often concerned about fairness, but this concern can be taken to extremes. As we know, life is not always fair. The person who goes though life looking for fairness in all their experiences will end up resentful and unhappy. Sometimes things will go our way, and sometimes they will not, regardless of how fair it may seem."

Emotional Reasoning

Believing "If I feel it, it must be true!" ". . . Involves thinking that if we feel a certain way, it must be true. For example, if we fel unattractive or uninteresting in the current moment, we must be unattractive or uninteresting. This cognitive distortion boils down to: 'I feel it, therefore it must be true.' Clearly, our emotions are not always indicative of the objective truth, but it can be difficult to look past how we feel."

Heaven's Reward Fallacy

Believing that any good act on your part will be repaid or rewarded. "This distortion involves expecting that any sacrifice or self-denial on our part will pay off. We may consider this karma, and expect that karma will always immediately reward us for our good deeds. Of course, this results in feelings of bitterness when we do not receive our reward."

Always Being Right

Believing that it is absolutely unacceptable to be wrong. While we all enjoy being right, this distortion makes us think we must be right, that being wrong is unacceptable. We may believe that being right is more important than the feelings of =others, being able to admit when we 'be made a mistake or being fair and objective."

Personalization

Believing that you are at least partially resposible for everything bad that happens around you. "This is a distortion where an individual believes that everything they do has an impact or external events or other people, no matter how irrational the link between. The person suffering from this distortion will feel that they have an unreasonably important role in the bad things that happen around them. For instance, a person may believe that the meeting they were a few minutes late in getting to was derailed because of them and that everything would have been fine if they were on time.

Polarized thinking/"Black and White" thinking

Black and white thinking, not seeing the grey. "This cognitive distortion is all about seeing black and white only, with no shades of grey. This is all-or-nothing thinking, with no room for complexity or nuance. If you don't perform perfectly in some area, then you may see yourself as a total failure instead of simply unskilled in one area."

Relaxed Breathing

Bring regularity and calm to your breath and create a sense of balance. "This is another technique that is not specific to CBT but will be familiar to practitioners of mindfulness. There are many ways to relax and bring regularity to your breath, including guided and unguided imagery, audio recordings, YouTube videos, and scripts. Bringing regularity and calm to your breath will allow you to approach your problems from a place of balance, facilitating more effective and rational decision making. This technique can help those suffering from a range of mental illnesses and afflictions, including anxiety, swpewaaion, OCD, and panic disorder, and they can be practiced with or without the guidance of a therapist."

Cognitive Restructuring

Challenge your harmful or destructive beliefs and restructure them. "Once you identify the distortions or inaccurate views on the world you hold, you can begin to learn about how this distortion took root and why you came to believe it. When you discover a belief that is destructive or harmful, you can begin to challenge it. For example, if you believe that you must have a high paying job to be a respectable person, but you lose your high paying job, you will begin to feel bad about yourself. Instead of accepting this faulty belief that leads you to think unreasonably negative thoughts about yourself, you could take this opportunity to think about what makes a person 'respectable,' a belief you may not have explicitly considered before."

Fallacy of Change

Expecting others to change to suit your needs or desires. "The fallacy of change lies in expecting other people to change as it suits us. This ties into the feeling that our happiness depends on other people, and their unwillingness or inability to change, even if we push and press and demand it, keeps us from being. This is clearly a damaging way to think since no one is responsible for our happiness except for us.

Exposure and Response Prevention

Expose yourself to whatever it is that normally provokes a compulsive behavior. "This technique is specifically effective for those who suffer from obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). You can practice this technique by exposing yourself to whatever it is that normally elicits a compulsive behavior, but doing your best to refrain from the behavior nd writing about it. You can combine journaling with this technique, or use journaling to understand how this technique makes you feel."

Interoceptive Exposure

Exposure yourself to sensations you are afraid of and recognize they are not dangerous. "This technique is intended to treat panic an nicety. It involves exposure to feared bodily sensations in order to elicit the response, activates any unhelpful beliefs associated with the sensations, maintains the sensations without distraction or avoidance, and allow new learning about the sensations to take place. It is intended to help the sufferer see that symptoms of panic are not dangerous, although they may be uncomfortable."

Play the Script Until the End

Finish a worst case scenario in your head to see that everything will likely turn out okay. This technique is especially useful for those suffering from fear and anxiety. In this technique, the individual who is vulnerable to crippling fear or anxiety conducts a sort of thought experiment, where they imagine the outcome of the worst case scenario. Letting this scenario play out can help the individual to recognize that even if everything they fear comes to pass, it will likely turn out okay.

Filtering

Focusing solely on the negative and ignoring all of the positive. ". . . The way many of us can somehow ignore all of the positive and good things in our day to focus solely on the negative. It can be far too easy to dwell on a single negative aspect, even when surrounded by an abundance of good things."

Journaling

Gathering data about your moods, their source / intensity, and your responses to them. ". . . Way of 'gathering data' about our moods and our thoughts. This journal can include the time of the mood or thought, the source of it, the extent or intensity, and how we responded to it, among other factors. This technique can help us to identify our thought patterns and emotional tendencies, describe them and find out how to change, adapt, or cope with them.

Global Labeling / Mislabeling

Generalizing one or two instances into an overall judgment, using exaggerated and emotionally loaded language. "This cognitive distortion is an extreme form of generalizing, in which we generalize one or two instances or qualities into a global judgment. For example, if we fail at a specific task, we may conclude that we are a total failure in not only this area but all areas. Alternatively, when a stranger says something a bit rude, we may conclude that he or she is an unfriendly person in general. Mislabeling is specific to using exaggerated and emotionally loaded language, such as saying a woman has abandoned her children when she leaves her children with a babysitter to enjoy a night out."

Shoulds

Holding tight to your personal rules on how people ought to behave. "'Shoulds' refer to the implicit or explicitly rules we have about how we and others should behave. When others read our rules, we are upset. When we break our own rules, we feel guilty. For example, we may have an unofficial rule that customer services representatives should always be accommodating to the customer. When we interact with a customer service representative that is not immediately accommodating, we might get angry. If we have an implicit rule that we are irresponsible if we spend money on unnecessary things, we may feel exceedingly guilty when we spend even a small amount of money on something we don't need."

Nightmare Exposure and Rescripting

Identify the emotion caused by a nightmare and cultivate a new emotion to replace it. Nightmare exposure and Rescripting are intended specifically for those suffering from nightmares. This technique is similar to interoceptive exposure, in that the nightmare is elicited, which brings up the relevant emotion. Once the emotion has arisen, the client and therapist work together to identify the desired emotion an d develop a new image to accompany the desired emotion.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR)

Relax one muscle groups at a time until your whole body is in a state of relaxation. "This is a familiar technique to those who practice mindfulness. Similar to the body scan, this technique instructs you to relax one muscle group at a time until your whole body is in a state of relaxation. You can use audio guidance, a YouTube video, or simply your own mind to practice this technique, and it can be especially helpful for calming nerves and soothing a busy and unfocused mind."

Blaming

Pointing to others when looking for a cause of any negative event, instead of looking at yourself. "When things don't go our way, there are many ways we can explain or assign responsibility for the outcome. One method of assigning responsibility is blaming others for what goes wrong. Sometimes we may blame others for making us feel or act a certain way, but this is a cognitive distortion because we are the only ones responsible for the way we feel or act."

Common Cognitive Distortions

There are 15: 1. Filtering 2. Polarized thinking 3. Overgenerallization 4. Jumping to conclusions 5. Catastrophizing 6. Personalization 7. Control fallacies 8. Fallacy of fairness 9. Blaming 10. Shoulds 11. Emotional reasoning 12. Fallacy of change 13. Global labeling / mislabeling 14. Always being right 15. Heaven's reward fallacy

Major CBT Techniques and Tools

There are 9: 1. Journaling 2. Unraveling Cognitive Distortions 3. Cognitive Restructuring 4. Exposure and Response Prevention 5. Interoceptive Exposure 6. Nightmare Exposure and Rescripting 7. Play the Script Until the End 8. Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR) 9. Relaxed Breathing

Control fallacies

Thinking everything that happens to you is either all of your fault or not at all your fault. ". . . Feeling that everything that happens to you is a result of external forces or due to your own actions. Sometimes what happens to us is due to forces we can't control, and sometimes what happens is due to our actions, but the false thinking is in assuming that it is always one or the other. We may assume that the quality of our work is due to working with difficult people, or alternatively that every mistake someone else makes is due to something we did."