Cognitive Approach- component 1 Flashcards
assumptions, relationship formation, therapies, classic evidence
1
Q
Describe and Explain the assumption ‘computer analogy’ with examples
A
- states human mind works in same way as computer
- how the mind takes in info (input), changes it/stores it (process) and recalls it (output), using cognitive processes, is similar to computer processes
- cognitive processes include perception, attention, memory etc
- Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968) devised multi store memory model, where info is input to brain through senses (eyes, ears etc) to go to the sensory memory, moves to short term memory (STM) store and then to long term memory store (LTM) and output when required.
- environmental stimuli input in sensory memory
- we pay attention to it so enters STM
- we rehearse info so enters LTM
- can retrieve info when needed and re enters STM
2
Q
Describe and Explain the assumption ‘internal mental processes’
A
- cognitive processes work together so people can make sense of surrounding environment
- cognitive processes include perception, attention, memory and language
- e.g. seeing a dog, we pay attention to it, perceive its features and search memory store to find out if weve seen it before and use language to name it. Internal mental processes work together to understand environment
3
Q
Provide a psychological example of the assumption ‘internal mental processes’
A
Introspection developed by Wilhelm and Wundt, involved reporting what a stimulus makes you think and feel
* Griffiths (1994) conducted study investigating the thought processes of regular gamblers compared to non regular gamblers, proposing regular gamblers would have more irrational thought processes. Participants asked to state everything they thought whilst playing on a fruit machine. Found gamblers had more irrational thoughts
4
Q
Describe and explain the assumtpion ‘Schemas’
A
- organised knowledge categories of information built through experience and stored in LTM
- e.g. dog schema contains info about dogs such as ‘4 legs’ ‘bark’
- generally derived from past experiences but can be refined through interactions with others and our environment
- are not always realistic as they are often built up through social exchanges e.g. conversations with others that may include gossip (not always truthful), rather than personal interactions
- schemas can take different forms, e.g. event schemas are called scripts (how we think situations unfold e.g. going to a restaurant)
5
Q
How do Schemas explain relationship formation?
A
- schemas of other peoplw may govern how we feel/act towards them
- Dio et al (1972) demonstrated people believe physically attractive people have attractive personal qualities. Schema is called the ‘halo effect’. If we believe someone has good personal qualities e.g. kind, due to physical attractiveness, we may be interested in forming relationship with them
- Seld schemas refer to how we feel about ourselves
- Matching hypothesis states how we perceive our physical attarctiveness influences who we engage in relationships with, particularly matching ourselves we feel match us in physical attraction.
- if our perception of our attarctiveness is low we will not go for those we perceive as attractive due to fear of rejection and vice versa
6
Q
How does the assumption ‘internal mental processes’ explain relationship formation?
A
- The way in which people perceive others determines whether they want to form a relationship with them.
- e.g. if you talk to a stranger at a party, your perceptions of them based on first impressions will influence whether you want to continue getting to know them
- If people have positive memories of past relationships e.g. romantic relationships, then they may be driven to forming new relationships BUT if memories are negative they may not want to form relationships with people even if they like them.
7
Q
How do the cognitive assumtpions apply to CBT?
A
- overall assumption states thoughts influence emotions and following behaviours. Cognitive psychologists believe psychological disorders stem from faulty/irrational thinking and the thinking patterns need to change to be cured, through CBT
- Internal mental proccesses such as perception impact behaviour and CBT therapist helps client change perceptions of world around them e.g. ‘nobody likes me’, as these irrational perceptions cause illness. Cognitive restructuring involves therapist questions the evidence base for client perceptions, so often client realises there is not evidence to show perception is true
- Aaron Beck proposed those with depression have developed schemas of 3 things, which are themselves, their environment and their future (cognitive triad).
- CBT helps client change negative schemas so they respond to world around them differently.
8
Q
How does CBT use behavourist and cognitive techniques?
A
- cognitive-behavioural
- cognitve as therapist works with client to help them identify negative thoughts that are contributing to their problems
- behaviourist because therapist encourages client to engage in reality testing, either during session e.g. role play or as homeowork.
9
Q
Describe the first stage of CBT, Dysfunctional thought diary
A
- Clients asked to keep a dysfunctional thought diary, which is a record of events leading up to any unpleasant emotions and record of automatic negative thoughts associated with those events and how much they believe in these thoughts on a scale of 1-100%.
- Clients write a rational response to the automatic thoughts and rate their belief in this rational response
- Clients re rate belief in automatic negative thoughts
10
Q
Describe the second stage of CBT, Cognitive restructuring
A
- identify and change negative thinking patterns
- e.g. client may become distressed about something they have overheard, assuming someone was talking about them. During CBT client taught to challenge dusfunctional automatic thoughts, by asking themselves where the evidence is for those automatic thoughts and asking themselves what is the worst that can happen even if thought is true.
- Replacing dysfunctional thoughts with constructive thoughts means client can try new ways of behaving
11
Q
Decribe the third stage of CBT, pleasant activity scheduling
A
- asking participant to plan one pleasant activity each day they will engage in (e.g. over a week) such as going to a new gym class
- thought that engagement in these activities will induce more positive emotions and focussinf on new things will distract them from negative thinking patterns.
- example of a behavioural activation technique-helping clients change their behaviour
- technique involves client keeping a record of the experience, how they felt and what the specific circumstances were. If the activity did not go as planned, client encouraged to explore why and what might be done to change it.
- by taking action that moves towards a positive solution and goal, patient moves further away from negative thinking and maladaptive behaviour.
12
Q
Evaluate CBT in terms of effectivness (research support)
treating anxiety and depression
A
- research suggests CBT effective to treat anxiety and deppression. Studies have compared effectiveness of CBT with drug therapy to treat severe depression.
- Jarret et al (1999) found CBT as effective as some antidepressant drugs when treating 108 patients with severe depression over a 10 week trial BUT Hollon et al (1992) found no difference in CBT when comapred to different antidepressant in sample of 107 over 10 week trial
- suggests CBT not superior to all antidepressants
13
Q
Evaluate the effectiveness of CBT (therapist competence)
A
- CBT more effective if therapist competence higher
- competency in CBT include ability to structure sessions, ability plan and review assignments, application of relaxation skills etc
- Kuyken and Tsivrikos (2009) claim that up 15% of the variance in outcomes of CBT effectiveness may be due to therapist competence
14
Q
Evaluate the effectiveness of CBT (individual differences)
A
- individual differences need to be considered when examining effectiveness of CBT
- CBT appears to be less suitable for people with high levels of irrational beliefs that are rigid and resistant to change
- appears to be less suitable in situations where high stress levels in the individual refelct realistic stressors in the person’s life that therapy cannot resolve (Simons et al, 1995)
15
Q
Evaluate the effectiveness of CBT (empowerment)
A
- CBT empowers clients to develop own coping strategies and recognises people have free will to do so
- CBT increasingly popular alternative to drug therapy and psychoanalysis, particularly with those who cannot cope with deterministic approach of those therapies
- This is partly why CBT become most widely used therapy by NHS clinical psychologists
16
Q
Evaluate CBT in terms of ethical considerations (patient blame)
A
- assumes client responsible for disorder
- strength as it gives client free will
- weakness as important situational factors may be overlooked that are contributing to disorder such as family problems or life events, that client cannot change
- blaming individual for the way they think/feel/behave may not be helpful because it may take other aspects of their life to change in order to help them feel better
17
Q
Evaluate CBT in terms of ethical considerations (rationality is subjective)
A
- therapist may believe a client thought is irrational so client feels they must change them, but they may not actually be irrational
- Alloy and Abrahamson (1979) suggest depressive realists tend to see the reality of situations but typical people tend to distor things in a positive way.
- Found depressed people display the ‘sadder but wiser effect’ and were more accurate in estimating likelihood of ‘disaster’ than non deppressed people.
- CBT may damage self esteem, which causes psychological harm
18
Q
State the methodology used in study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
A
- 2 laboratory experiments
- independent groups design
- Experiment 1 had 45 student participants
- Experiment 2 had 150 student participants
- different set of participants in each experiment
19
Q
Describe the procedures of Experiment 1 in the study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
A
- participants shows 7 film clips of different traffic accidents each 5-30 seconds long
- participants given questionnaire asking them to give an account of accident they had just seen and also series of specific questions about accident
- one ‘critical’ question asked participants ‘About how fast were the cars going when they ‘…’ each other?’, with the word used varying in each group and were either ‘hit, smashed, collided, bumped or contacted’
* participants speed estimates in each group recorded in mph
20
Q
Describe the Procedures of Experiment 2 in the study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
Investigated whether leading questions simply bias a person’s response or actually alter the memory that is stored
A
- participants shown a film of a multiple car crash. Actual accident lasted less than 4 seconds
- participants asked a set of questions including the critical question about speed
- participants divided into 3 groups of 50
- group 1 asked ‘how fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?’
- group 2 asked ‘how fast were the cars going when they hit each other?’
- group 3 was control group and no question asked - 1 week later participants asked more questions about filmed accident
- critical question all participants asked was ‘ did you see any broken glass?’ (no broken glass in film but presumably those who thought car travelling faster might expect there to be broken glass)
21
Q
What findings did Loftus and Palmer (1974) gather from Experiment 1
A
- mean speed estimate calculated for each experimental group
- group given the word ‘smashed’ estimated higher speed than other groups (40.8 mph)
- group given the word ‘contacted’ estimated lowest speed (31.8 mph)
22
Q
What Findings did Loftus and Palmer (1974) gather from Experiment 2?
A
- participants gave high speed estmates in the ‘smashed’ condition, which was the same as participants in experiment 1
- Participants in ‘smashed’ condition were more than twice as likely to report seeing broken glass than those given the word ‘hit’ or in the control condition
- 16 in ‘smashed’ condition reported having seen broken glass, 34 reported not seeing any
- 7 in ‘hit’ condition’ reported having seen broken glass, 43 reported not having seen any
- 6 in control condition reported having seen broken glass, 44 reported not having seen any.
23
Q
What Conclusions did Loftus and Palmer (1974) make from their study?
A
- findings indicate the form of a question can a witness’s answer to question
- proposed 2 explanations for this
- response bias factors occur as the critical word in critical question (smashed/hit etc) influences/biases a response so different speed estimates occur
- the memory representation is altered as the critical word alters memory so perception of accident changed. Some critical words would lead someone to have perceived an accident as more serious
- more people from ‘smashed’ condition in experiment 2 reported seeing broken glass, proving leading questions alter the memory an individual has for an event and the results are not due to response bias.
24
Q
Evaluate the Methodology and Procedures in study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
controlled experiment
A
- research conducted using experiments, which demonstrates a causal relationship. By deliberately manipulating IV (verb used to describe impact), causal effect on DV seen (estimate of speed). Causal conclusions can then be made.
- Laboratory studies control confouding variables so any change to dependent variable due to IV and not any other factors, rather than field experiments where confouding variables may effect DV.
- This is a strength of study
25
Q
Evaluate the Methodology and Procedures used in study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
Ecological Validity
A
- weakness
- lacks ecological validity as film clips of accidents not the same as witnessing a real accident
- people do not take task seriouslt and/or not emotionally aroused in same way so findings may not represent real life
- in real life EWT may be more accurate e.g. Foster et al (1994) found that if participants thought they were watching a real life robbery and also thought their responses would influence the trial, they provided more accurate identifications of a robber
- BUT Buckout (1980) conducted a ‘real life’ study with 2000 participants. Short film shown on TV and later an identity parade shown on TV and vieweres invited to phone in their choice of suspect, but only 14% were correct
26
Q
Evaluate the Methodology and Procedures of the study by Loftus and Palmer (1974)
The sample was not representative of whole target population (everyone)
A
- weakness
- participants were US college students but other groups of people may be more/less prone to being affected by misleading info than others
- e.g. there may be age differences, which may be due to source monitoring. Eyewitness typically acquires info from 2 sources, from observing event itself and from subsequent suggestions (misleading info)
- studies have found in comparison with younger people, elderly have difficulty remembering the source of their info, even though their memory for the info is not impaired, so become more prone to the effect of misleading info when giving EWT.
- there is a cultural bias as all participants from US, a western culture
- does not take into account individual differences such as age, socioeconomic background etc
27
Q
Evaluate the findings and conclusion of the study
Alternative Evidence
A
- support from other studies on effect of misleading info
- Loftus conducted a study, in which college students asked to evaluate the advertising material about Disneyland
- in material there was misleading info about either Bugs Bunny or Ariel
- these characters could not be seen at Disneyland as Bugs Bunny not Disney and Ariel had not been itroduced at the time of their childhood
- Participants assigned to Bugs Bunny, Ariel or Control Condition (no misleading info). All participants had visited Disneyland.
- Participants in Bugs or Ariel group more likely to report having shaken hands with these characters than control group, showing misleading info can create inaccurate memory
28
Q
Evaluate the study by Loftus and Palmer (1974) in terms of Ethical and Social Implications
Lack of Valid Consent
A
- did not gain valid consent from participants
- if participants aware of aims of study, this would have affected their behaviour due to demand characteristics (would be aware the questions were leading so would be more careful with responses, so behaviour would not reflect EWT in everyday life and not provide useful insights)
- Deception can be justified by researchers in terms of importance of this research as it had improved understanding of inaccuracy of EWT
- Deception was mild in terms of effects this had on participants as no psychological/physical harm caused and unlikley knowing true purpose of study would have led to their refusal to take part
29
Q
Evaluate the study by Loftus and Palmer (1974) in terms of Ethical and Social Implications
study had low ecological validity but psychological harm may have been caused if participants exposed to a real accident
A
- criticised that study has low ecological validity as participants did not witness a real accident, as they were shown film clips of accidents, so may not have responded to task in same way as eyewitness would in real accident
- BUT exposure to real accident may have been very distressing, leading to psychological harm
- psychological harm may not be reversed by debreifing so may have long term emotional effects
- study avoided issue of psychological harm by using film clips
- this is a strength
