Cognitive-Behaviour Mod Flashcards
-Private Event
- a behaviour that is only observable to the person who emits it
- also called “covert behaviour”
- all “metal/cognitive” events are private events
- Private events are not necessarily mental/subjective
- a sneeze no on knows about
- By definition, unverifiable to science
-Public event
-a behaviour that is observable by a person other than the one engaging in the behaviour
Also known as “overt behaviour”
-can be verified by scientific methods
Can private events be “inferred” by using science?
- contemporary psychological research claims to study the “inner” world by using methods to objectively examine public behaviour
- e.g., reaction time tests, questionnaires, etc.
- assume the inner world is necessary for a complete understanding of behaviour
- inner world is “inferred” from external behaviour
- problems:
- circuitry
- category errors
- violates logic of the experimental method
- obscures the search for the real controlling variable
- AI
- blindsight
Lubinski and Thompson (1993)
- pigeons were ‘supposedly’ trained to report private events
- if drug A was administered pigeons would need to peck the “A key” to get food
- if drug B was administered pigeons would need to peck the ‘B key’ to get food
- if the wrong key was selected, no food would be given
- The pigeons learned to peck correctly
- authors concluded that the pecks were under the stimulus control of the private feelings produced by the drugs
- authors should have concluded that the pecks were under the stimulus control of the actual drugs themselves
-However, this doesn’t mean private events can’t, in principle, function as a S^D
-Three main types:
- Methodological Behaviourism
- Radical Behaviourism
- Teleological/Molar Behaviourism
Methodological Behaviourism
- Emerged in the early 1900s
- Based off a dualistic (mind and body) conception of reality
- distinguished between subjective/qualitive (“inner”) and objective (“outer”) world
- outer world is the same for everyone and can generate agreed upon facts
- each person’s inner worlds is potentially different, inaccessible and not necessarily causal
- The only way to establish a legitimate science of behaviour was through experimental methods that were objective
- the type of behaviourism described by most textbooks and laymen
- often referred to as S-R (stimulus response)
- evolved into contemporary cognitive psychology
Watson and Contemporary Psychology
- many researchers claiming to study mental/cognitive processes are methodological behaviourists
- no method to study the “inner world”
- from a dualistic worldview this leaves methodological behaviourism incomplete
- contemporary psychology claims to study the “inner” world by using methods to objectively examine external behaviour
- problematic
Radical Behaviorism
- First described in the 1970s by Skinner
- Based on the philosophy of pragmatism and rejects dualism
- does not make distinction between subjective/qualitive (inner) and objective (outer) worlds
- Thoughts, imaginings, and feelings are just more behaviour to be explained. Bu they are private and have environmental antecedents that are more useful for the purposes of behavioural change
- Origins of behaviour (public and private) are in the environment
- Does not allow mediators to act as inferred casual entities
- minds, expectations, intentions, representations, schema, etc. cannot serve as valid explanations for behaviour
- focuses on terms (not methods) that emphasize the function (reason/cause) of a behaviour
- e.g., man is observed running
- does her run to train for the Olympics of does he run to escape the police
- to a methodological behaviourist, the running is the same behaviour in both cases. A radical behaviourist views them as distinct behaviours
Teleological (Molar) Behaviourism
- developed in the early 1990s
- Created by Howard Rachlin and built off the philosophy of Gilbert Ryle
- Similar to radical behaviourism in its rejection of dualism and emphasis on function
- does not make public-private or a subjective-objective distinction
- is a pragmatic view, not a metaphysical one
- what is traditionally viewed as mental events are just labels of behaviors extended through time
String Quartet Question
-what is the difference between two awake individuals, one of whom is stone deaf, sitting in a room listening to a string quartet
- Methodological Behaviourism:
- there is no distinction, their behaviours are the same
- Cognitive/Folk Psychology
- one person has the metal/subjective state of “hearing/listening”, the other person does not
- Radical Behaviourism
- one person experiences the private events of hearing/listening, the other does not
- in both cases the private events are unverifiable behaviors the person is engaging in
- Note: none of these answers have any use on a practical level
- i.e., they don’t allow us to solve who is the deaf person
- Teleological/Molar Behaviourism
- the question is flawed because it si looking at behaviour at a single point in time. Behaviour extends through time
- behaviourally speaking to “hear the music” means
- certain behaviours will occur over time in the presence of the music and not in its absence
- e.g., tapping your foot saying how much you enjoy the music
- the difference is that the non-deaf person will discriminate their behaviors to the sound over time, the deaf person will not
Some notes about Ch. 25 in your textbook
- “Cognitive Behaviour Modification” is “Cognitive Therapy” as understood by radical Behaviourism
- Miltenberger treats thoughts, self-statements and imaginings as private stimuli/behaviour that can have functions on a persons’ public behaviour
- can function as CS, EO, S^D, S^delta
- Miltenberger eliminates the explanatory functions (invented causes) of cognitive therapy that acnt as causal mediators
- schema
Cognitive Therapy
- cognitive therapy emerged in the late 1970s as a response to the clinical shortcomings of methodological behaviourisms stimulus-response psychology
- viewed thoughts, feelings, and other mental events as causal
- mental events mediate the relation between the environment and behavior (dualistic)
- largely based off the work of Aaron T. Beck and Albert Ellis
- Merged with existing behaviour therapies (BT) to form what is now referred to as CBT
Behavior therapies (BT)
-Applied Behaviour analysis therapies
rational-emotive therapy, systemic rational restructuring, and cogntive therapy
-Behavioural Activation Therapy
- BAT (Lewinsohn’s old version)
- BA (Martell et al.’s updated version)
- BATD (Behaviour Activation Therapy for Depression)
the therapist gets the patient to engage in a number of different reinforcing activities each week
- Functional Analytic Psychotherapy
- Integrative Behavioral Couples Therapy
- Dialectical Behaviour Therapy
- Acceptance and Commitment therapy
acceptance and commitment - client learns that they have not been able to control troublesome thoughts and feelings in the pas t that attempts to control thoughts and feelings have made the client’s problem worse. Client learns to accept that the thoughts and feeling will continue to occur and they can still achieve meaningful behavioral change goals
CBT for Depression
- CBT has been generally successful in the treatment of depression
- Clinical contributions of CT called into question by Jacobson et al., 1996
- CBT treatments of depression usually are a mix of cognitive therapy and behavioural activation therapy (BA, Lewinsohns 1974)
- Jacobson et al. ran a clinical trial that separated various therapeutic components
- BA alone was as effective as the full CBT treatment
- these findings led to refinement in Behavioral Activation therapy
Dimidjian et al. 2006
- used a randomized-placebo controlled design
- tested the effects of Cognitive therapy, behavioural activation therapy and anti-depressant medication on 241 adults with major-depressive disorder
- ADM = paroxetine (SSRI)
- Two measures
- Beck Depression Inventory
- Hamilton rating scale for depression
- corrected methodological problems of past component analysis
Defining “Cognitive-Behaviour”
- involves self-talk on imaginal behaviour
- Occurs privately/covertly
- i.e. can only be ‘measured’ by target
- must identify the occurrence of the specific thoughts, images etc
- identify the specific cognitive behaviours, not just for labels for them
The Problem of Circular Reasoning
The observed behaviour is given a label
The label is then used as the explanation for the behaviour
The label is simply a name for the behaviour and cant be the cause of the behaviour
The causes of the behaviour are found in the environment
Cognitive Behaviour in Clinical Problems
-Examples of behavioural excesses
- depression
- obsessions / rumination
- fears / phobias
- Chronic worry
-Examples of behavioural deficits
- positive affirmations
- high self-confidence statements
Functions of Cognitive Behaviour
-Respondent functions
- a thought or image may function as a CS
- e.g., thoughts or images elicit anxiety, anger, sexual arousal
-Operant Functions
- a thought or image can functions as an S^D
- e.g., verbal instructions to find a location
- a thought or image can function as an EO
- e.g., a fearful thought is an EO for escape
- A though or image can functions as a reinforcer or punisher
- e.g., praise following a specific action
-Cognitive Restructuring
-used to replace maladaptive cognitive behaviours with adaptive ones
-Cognitive Coping
-used to teach new cognitive-behaviours which in turn promote other desirable behaviours
Cognitive Restructuring
- goal is to replace distressing thoughts with more desirable (rational or functional) thoughts
- note: “thoughts” = cognitive-behaviours
- Steps in cognitive restructuring
1. Identify the distressing thoughts
2. Identify the situations where they occur (the antecedents) and the emotional response, mood, or behaviour that follow (the consequences) from self-report or self-monitoring
3. Help the client replace distressing/distorted thoughts with functional thoughts
Challenging the client’s ’distorted’ thinking
- Burns uses a series of three questions
1. What is the evidence?
2. Are there alternative explanations?
3. What are the implications? - Used to challenge cognitive distortions
Cognitive Coping Skills Training
-Self-instructional training
- Identify the problem situation and behaviour, the desirable behaviour
- Identify the self-instructions to be used in the situation
- Teach self-instructions and provide immediate reinforcement through modelling/BST
- Use the self-instructions in the problem to guide desirable behaviour
all or nothing thinking
yo look at things in absolute black and white categories
over generalization
you view a negative event as a never ending pattern of defeat
discounting the positives
you insist that your accomplishes or positive qualities don’t count
jumping to conclusions
mind reading - you assume that people are reacting negatively to you when there’s no definite evidence
fortune telling - you arbitrarily predict that things will turn out badly
magnification or minimization
you blow things way out of proportion or you shrink their importance
labelling
instead of saying “I made a mistake” you tell yourself “I’m a jerk, loser etc”
Personalization and blame
you blame yourself for something you weren’t entirely responsible for, or you blame other people and deny your role in the problem
cognitive behavior modification
procedures are used to help people change behaviors that are labeled as cognitive. Always get a behavioral definition of the cognitive behavior
cognitive restructuring
are designed to replace specific maladaptive cognitive behaviors with more adaptive ones. Usually used for behavior excesses
cognitive coping skills training
designed to teach new cognitive behaviors that are then used to promote other desirable behaviors. Usually used for behavioral deficits
teach client specific self-statements that they can make in a problem situation to improve their performance or influence their behavior in the situation
steps in cogntive restructuring
- identify distressing thoughts and situations
- identify emotional response or behavior that follows the thoughts
- work to decrease distressing thoughts and replace with with more rational or desirable thinking
