The Cognitive Errors in Depression

1. The Cognitive Errors in Depression Present student with an assessment of depression that focuses on loneliness and other factors associated with mood issues.

2. Cognitive Errors in Depression • Aaron Beck’s work with depressed patients convinced him that depression is primarily a disorder of thinking rather than of mood. • He argued that depression can best be described as a cognitive triad of negative thoughts about • oneself, • the situation • the future

3. Cognitive Errors in Depression • The depressed person misinterprets facts in a negative way, focuses on the negative aspects of any situation, and also has pessimistic expectations about the future. • Beck listed 5 cognitive errors of depressed people. • Which one(s) do you do the most?

4. Cognitive errors of depressed people • 1.  Over generalizing: Drawing global conclusions about worth, ability, or performance on the basis of a single fact. • 2.  Selective abstraction: Focusing on one insignificant detail while ignoring the more important features of a situation.

5. Cognitive errors of depressed people • 3.  Personalization: Incorrectly taking responsibility for bad events in the world. • 4.  Magnification and minimization: Gross evaluations of a situation in which small, bad events are magnified and large, good events are minimized.

6. Cognitive errors of depressed people • 5.  Arbitrary inference: Drawing conclusions in the absence of sufficient evidence or of any evidence at all. • 6.  Dichotomous thinking: Seeing everything in one extreme or its opposite (black or white, good or bad).

7. Cognitive errors of depressed people • Which do you engage in most? • 1.  Over generalizing • 2.  Selective abstraction • 3.  Personalization • 4.  Magnification and minimization • 5.  Arbitrary inference • 6.  Dichotomous thinking • How might you counteract these errors?