Cognitive Explanation for Depression

Question 1

Beck’s Negative Triad

Answer 1

• Beck (1967): why some are more vulnerable to depression than others.
• A person’s cognitions (thinking patterns) create this vulnerability.

Question 2

Faulty Information Processing (Beck’s Negative Triad)

Answer 2

• Focusing only on negative aspects and ignore positives.
• Tendency towards ‘black and white thinking’ (all good or all bad).

Question 3

Negative Self-Schema (Beck’s Negative Triad)

Answer 3

• Self-schema: package of information about themselves.
• Negative self-schema: all information interpreted in a negative way.

Question 4

Negative triad

Answer 4

• Dysfunctional view of the self develops due to negative triad:
  1. Negative view of the world.
  2. Negative view of the future.
  3. Negative view of the self.

Question 5

Evaluation

Research Support

Answer 5

• Clarke and Beck (1999) review: cognitive vulnerabilities more common in depressed patients but preceded the depression.
• Cohen et al (2019) prospective study: tracked development of 473 adolescents and measured cognitive vulnerability.
• Result: association between cognitive vulnerability and depression.

Question 6

eval real world

Answer 6

• Cohen et al (2019): screen young people to identify risk of depression and monitor.
• Cognitive vulnerability can be applied to CBT.
• Cognitive vulnerability is useful in more than one aspect of clinical practice.
• Screening, monitoring, and CBT.

Question 7

Evaluation pa

Answer 7

• Some aspects of depression aren’t explained well: extreme anger, hallucinations, delusions etc.