Cognitive Techniques

Cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT is a practical psychological approach to treating problems of negative thinking and unwanted behaviour.

CBT differs from traditional psycho-therapeutic approaches in that it focuses on treating the immediate symptoms of the patient – the problematic present behaviours and thought patterns, rather than trying to understand their historical roots in the patients remote past. 

Unlike Freudian derived psycho-therapy, the modern and practical techniques involved in CBT have been proven to be effective for treating disorders ranging from anxiety problems, depression, schizophrenia, as well as shyness and numerous other phobias.

An example of a cognitive technique used in CBT to treat social anxiety is the use of ‘reality testing’.  Instead of hours spent discussing an event in the patient’s childhood that may have originated his anxiety problem (for example, being humiliated in front of his schoolmates by an unpleasant teacher), the cognitive therapist will try to change the present unhelpful thought patterns that directly cause the emotional and physical symptoms of anxiety whenever the patient enters a social situation.  The therapist might seek to change the patient’s negative thought processes by demonstrating their irrationality and falseness. For example, by highlighting the gap between what the patient fears will happen in a social situation with what has actually happened and what does in fact happen.

Cognitive behavioral therapy is practical and empowering for the patient.  Rather than inertly discussing long past events that the sufferer has no influence over, the therapist sets his patient exercises to perform and cognitive techniques to learn that will enable him to recognise the emergence of his symptoms and to successfully control them.