There is no doubt that the topic of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) provides enough engaging

substance for numerous books and articles. The emphasis on the importance of cognitive thinking and

its role in determining our emotions and actions was endearing and, indeed, evolutionary in the world of

psychotherapy where dissatisfaction grew the strictly behavioural approach. In this assignment,

discussion will be made concerning only the key components of CBT, as proposed by Beck, a world-

renowned cognitive-behavioural psychotherapist, and his associates. Furthermore, descriptions of how

negative automatic thoughts (NATS) might interact and affect our behaviour will be examined.

With regards to CBT are its main components. These distinctly include “automatic thoughts, conditional

beliefs such as underlying assumptions […], and unconditional core beliefs […]” (Sanders and Wills.,

2005). With regards to the outermost level of cognition, automatic thoughts are reared from assumptions

and core beliefs. This term is used to describe spontaneous flow of occurrences of thoughts and images

(Beck, 1976). These thoughts or actions may not always be consciously generated by the person, hence

the word “automatic.”

Next to automatic thoughts are assumptions. These are sometimes called “rules for living” (Simmons

and Griffiths, 2013) because they function as instructions that conduct our everyday activities and

expectations. They are often congruent with (negative) core beliefs in that the former is a means by

which an individual can avoid confronting them. For instance, someone’s assumption could be “I need

to be the highest in my class.” Related to this conditional belief is the second assumption, “If I do not

perform perfectly, then I am both a disappointment and failure to everyone around me.”

The deepest level of cognition, core beliefs, otherwise considered as ‘early maladaptive schema’, are

long established, deeply rooted convictions which are often developed from childhood (Wills, 2012).

These are connected to cognitive thinking in that it helps form the fabric of an individual’s absolute

perception of self, others and the world, as well as determining emotional states and behaviours. These

plain, but often flawed notions rule and limit us until we bring them into consciousness and begin to

challenge them.
Equally as important as the key components of CBT is its basis. The foundations were built from five

interacting elements, namely one’s physiological sensations, emotional experiences, thoughts, behaviour

and environment. It can be said that these five elements was founded upon the idea that an individual’s

cognitive processes could critically sway his or her emotional experiences and behavior (Beck, 1991).

Let us use an example of a fictional character named Jack to help illustrate this point. Jack recently

failed his driving test and quickly comes to the conclusion that he is a failure. This suddenly elicits an

emotion of acute anxiety and feelings of apprehension, fear and inadequacy during any and every exam

he sits. In consequence of this, he experiences physical sensations of sweating, blushing and so forth.

Thus, his behavioural response is to completely neglect studying and school work by playing video

games.

In this, one can see the exchange between the internal world of Jack and the external environment

surrounding him. Interestingly, how he perceived the exchange determined how he felt, which, in turn,

influenced how he behaved. What we can gather from such a case is that our feelings are not set by the

event, but rather are dictated by how we interpret it (Neenan and Dryden, 2014).

Unfortunately, with many similar cases like Jack, issues arise when mental disorders are caused, again,

by how events are interpreted, and not by the actual event itself. Indeed, Beck, as a result of his findings,

learned that his depressed clients persistently and almost automatically experienced a “narrow range of

negative themes in [dismal thinking]” (Barnard and Teasdale, 2014). They amplified the negative, over-

generalised the bad events, ignored the positives in their lives and took things in a personal manner. He

called these particularly distorted cognitives “automatic thoughts” because he realised that patients were

not necessarily aware of its existence. He then discovered that it could be branched into three groups:

negative ideas about themselves, the world, and the future (Beck, 1996).

Between these three categories, two common factors can be found i.e. the all-or-nothing thinking and

over-generalisation. Referring back to Jack’s dilemma, because he failed a test he concludes that he is a

failure and will not be able to repeat the test again due to his level of intelligence: “I studied and gave
my all during this exam, but still I ended up failing. Because I have been taught from childhood that

success equates worth, this proves I am worthless and a failure.” This black-and-white/all-or-nothing

thinking can harm his mental health with depression, and can even potentially lead to suicidal despair.

Closely related to the all-or-nothing thinking is the cognitive pattern of over-generalisation. This is

exemplified, again, in Jack’s situation. His failure to pass compels him to arbitrarily believe that he will

similarly fail other future exams. This way of thinking can lead to a lack of enthusiasm to succeed

academically, which would, in turn, decrease his chances of passing anything. Thus, this self-prophecy

is inadvertently fulfilled.

From a CBT perspective, if Jack were to alter his cognitive thinking process, it could lead to a much

better result. Instead of perceiving himself as a complete failure, he could make an honest and direct

evaluation of his past performance, identify specific areas for improvement and then, most importantly,

devise ways of putting the negative expectations to the test. It is crucial to remember that the goal in

CBT is not to replace NATS but rather to question the evidence of the fear-provoking thoughts, analyse

the self-destructive beliefs, and test out the reality of the pessimistic predictions. (Beck 1976, 1999)

What first became attempts at developing treatments for mental health problems became the landmark

of a breakthrough in the world of psychotherapy. The exploration of the key components of cognitive

behavioural therapy and its model, as well as their contributions in the development of maladaptive

behaviour proved to be a success in the treatment of clients’ disorders. From reading this, one can easily

surmise that the manner in which an individual approaches experiences in life can be proven either

disturbingly detrimental or blissfully beneficial to his or her mental health and physical well-being.