Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) as an evidence-based intervention which aims to reduce symptoms of psychological conditions such as anxiety and depression. CBT aims to help individuals learn how to identify and change destructive, negative or disturbing thought patterns which negatively affect one’s behaviour and emotions.
Conceptually, CBT is based on the premise that your thoughts, feelings and behaviours are interconnected. Thus, if you are able to acknowledge and challenge your maladaptive thoughts, you are able to break the cycle of maladaptive emotions and behaviours. This is a widely used intervention in treating mental health problems as it helps individuals to deal with overwhelming problems in adaptive ways.
CBT assumes that how we interpret or think about situations in our daily life can influence how we feel and behave. For example, if someone is writing an exam and immediately thinks, “I have no time to study, I’m going to fail,” there is a good chance that these negative thoughts would make them feel anxious, and they will have difficulty focusing on studying or avoid it altogether. Alternatively, if they change that thought to something more adaptive such as, “I have little time to study, how do I make the most of what little time I have?” then they might have less anxiety and a more organized, adaptive approach to concentrate and a focused goal-driven quality study time.
The beauty of the CBT approach is that when individuals become aware of how their thoughts, actions and feelings work together, an opportunity s introduced: to either carry on as usual with our maladaptive thoughts/feelings/behaviours or make a conscious choice and shift them. Once we decide to modify any one of these three parts, we can create change in the other parts.