Depression
- Created by: aryan26
- Created on: 12-02-19 10:03
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- Depression
- More severe frequent and long lasting feelings of low mood
- Classified as a mood disorder, sometimes called unipolar depression
- Emotional characteristics
- Reduced positive emotions and increased negative
- Intense felelings of sadness, emptiness, hopelessnessand worthlessness
- Loss of the ability to experience pleasure
- Low self-esteem: emotional experience of how much we like ourselves
- Negative a motions such as anxiety or anger
- Cognitive characteristics
- Thinking patterns reflect negative emotions
- View themselves negatively- believing they are worthless
- Bias towards seeing things in the worst possible light
- Future is viewed negatively- view that nothing will get better
- Poor concentration,indecisiveness and thoughts of death
- Behavioural characteristics
- Reduced activity- loss of energy and motivation
- Withdrawal from activities and relationships
- Some are in a more agitated state- psychomotoragitation e.g. restlessness and pacing
- Changes in sleeping and eating
- Aggression and self-harm
- Reduced activity- loss of energy and motivation
- cognitive explanations
- main cause is cognition- irrational or unhelpful thoughts=negative emotional states which lead to depression
- Beck's negative triad
- negative schemas can develop in response to unhappy childhood experiences
- these can create systematic cognitive biases: everything is viewed in a negative light
- overgeneralisation: making general conclusions about single negative events
- magnification: exaggerating small problems into larger ones
- identified a negative triad of thinking which is a pessimistic, irrational view about the self, the world and future
- evidence to support the role of negative thinking-
- Boury et al: used becks depression inventory to monitor student's negative thoughts
- depressives misinterpret things negatively and feel hopeless about the future
- Boury et al: used becks depression inventory to monitor student's negative thoughts
- no evidence of cause and effect: Temple-Wisconsin study
- measured students thinking styles every few months- 17% of students who scored high on tests of negative thinking went on to become depressed
- 1% on low scores
- measured students thinking styles every few months- 17% of students who scored high on tests of negative thinking went on to become depressed
- criticised for blaming the patient- may overlook other factors such as situational or biological
- if these factors were resolved they may no longer think negatively
- negative schemas can develop in response to unhappy childhood experiences
- Ellis' ABC model
- people mistakenly blame external events for their illness
- A= activating event B=beliefs about the event C=consequence
- activating event (A) triggers irrational beliefs which are seen to be true (B)
- consequence is that they become depressed (C)
- difference between depressed and non depressed individuals is self-perception
- both assume irrational beliefs cause depression- evidence suggests that depressed people are more accurate in jusdgements
- practical applications- development of cognitive behavioural therapies
- cognitive approach to treatment
- based on the assumption it is caused by the way the patient views themselves and the world
- identify maladaptive thought processes and replace with adaptive thoughts
- rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT)
- the main idea is to challenge irrational thoughts, however, with Ellis’s theory this is achieved through ‘dispute’ (argument).
- logical dispute – where the therapist questions the logic of a person’s thoughts
- for example: ‘does the way you think about that situation make any sense?
- empirical dispute – where the therapists seeks evidence for a person’s thoughts,
- for example: ‘where is the evidence that your beliefs are true?’
- Pragmatic disputing- emphasises the lack of usefulness in self defeating beliefs
- for example: 'how likely is it that this belief will help me?'
- Following a session, the therapist may set their patient homework. The idea is that the patient identifies their own irrational beliefs and then proves them wrong.
- Cuijpers: reviewed 75 studies and found that CBT was superior to no treatment
- especially effective if combined with drug therapy
- David: compared REBT, Beck's CBT and antidepressants- equally effective at end of treatment
- at a 6month follow up REBT was more effective
- effectiveness depends on many factors: as much as 15% of the variance depends on therapist competence
- requires commitment Ellis believes takes an average of 27 sessions: not suitable for some
- ethical problems: blames the patient- may lead to self-blame and guilt
- requires commitment Ellis believes takes an average of 27 sessions: not suitable for some
- fails to address environmental causes and ignores biological basis
- expensive: anti-depressants are cheaper and reduce symptoms in a few weeks with little effort from the depressive
- may be more costeffective: DeRbubeis- relapse rates are lower. initial higher cost may be worth it
- expensive: anti-depressants are cheaper and reduce symptoms in a few weeks with little effort from the depressive
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