Cognitive approach to explaining depressions Flashcards
Cognitive approach
The approach to the meaning of mental process in the mind and the brain (e.g. thoughts, perceptions etc)
3 parts of cognitive vulnerability; faulty information processing
When being depressed and you win the lottery for example, you may then think about how you could have won £10 million last week but you won £1 million this week; this is faulty information processing.
part 2; negative self schemas
A schema is a package of information which is stored in the LTM and can be adapted to different situations. A negative self schema is when the package of information we have of our self is all negative and everything about them self is wrong.
part 3; the negative triad
When people develop a negative view of them self, there are three types of negative thinking that occurs; the negative triad.
A) negative view of the world; thinking there is no hope with the world, e.g. “the world is a cold, hard place”.
B) negative view of the future, thinking that there is no hope in humanity for the future, e.g. “whats the point of living, we’re all gonna die”
C) negative view of the self; thinking that you’re a failure , all of these thoughts enhance depression.
Evaluation; it has good supporting evidence
Graziali and Terry (2000) studied 65 pregnant women before and after they gave birth to identify any cognitive vulnerability and depression. The results showed that after giving birth, they found that those women all were high in cognitive vulnerability therefore meaning they are more likely to suffer post-natal depression.
Evaluation; it has practical application in CBT
Strengthens becks theory because it can easily be applied to CBT meaning that doctors and therapists can use it for real life therapy and identify using the negative triad; therefore meaning the study has external validity and can translate into successful therapies.
Evaluation; it doesn’t explain all aspects of depression
Depression is complex, some people are depressed and are extremely angry; beck cannot explain this emotion. Even people have hallucinations from being depressed, yet beck still can’t explain this emotion.
Ellis’s ABC model
He believed that conditions such as anxiety and depression are caused by something called irrational thoughts (thoughts that interfere with being happy of free of pain). Ellis used this ABC model to explain how irrational thoughts can cause depression.
A) Activating event - Ellis states that activating negative and unhappy events causes irrational thoughts, for example, failing a test will cause irrational thoughts.
B) Beliefs - Ellis identified different beliefs which cause these irrational thoughts, “mustarbation” is the thought of thinking everything should achieve perfection. “I-can’t-stand-it-itis”is the thought that everything is a disaster when things don’t go as smoothly as wanted.
C) Consequences - activating events can cause irrational thoughts meaning that if you don’t succeed at something for example, it may cause the consequence of depression.
Evaluation - a partial explanation
Psychologists believe that different kinds of depressions is caused by different thoughts, this is known as reactive depression. Meaning that Ellis’s explanation only applies for certain types of depression and not all of them.
