Cognitive-Behavior Modification

A B CAntecedentsenvironment

beliefs

Beliefsrational

irrational

Consequencesemotional reaction

behavioral response

Cognitive A-B-C Model

Antecedents Belief Consequences

Teacher asks question “I know the answer!” Emotion: joyBehavior: raise hand

Billy calls Jimmy a jerk “If I let him talk to me thatway I’m a sissy.”

Emotion: hurtBehavior: hits Billy

Spelling test “I’m lousy at spelling.” Emotion: inadequacyBehavior: complains ofstomachache

Four Irrational Conclusions1. Awfulizing. Individuals express a belief that a situation is

more than 100% bad, worse then it absolutely should be.

2. I-can’t-stand-it-its (low frustration tolerance). Individuals say they cannot envision being able to endure situations or having any happiness at all if what they demand must not exist actually exists.

3. Damnation. Individuals tend to be excessively critical of self, others, and/or life conditions.

4. Always-and-never thinking. Individuals will insist on absolutes (e.g., that they will always fail or never be approved by significant others).

Past Trends in Cognitive Therapy

• Dissatisfaction with behavior modification

• Focus on social learning theory

• Development of cognitive psychology

Reciprocal Determinism

Cognition

EnvironmentBehavior

Personal preferences influence when and which programs, from among the available alternatives, individuals choose to watch on television. Although the potential televised environment is identical for all viewers, the actual televised environment that impinges on given individuals depends on what they select to watch. Through their viewing behavior, they partly shape the nature of the future televised environment. Because production costs and commercial requirements also determine what people are shown, the options provided in the televised environment partly shape the viewers’ preferences.

Problems Assessing Cognition

• It is difficult to assess individuals’ cognitions.• Cognitive activity is covert—it occurs internally

and is not subject to direct observation.• The behavior of a child does not always

correspond with certain cognitions.• Just because a child engages in negative self-talk

does not mean her beliefs are dysfunctional.• Whenever we make an inference about cognition

from one’s behavior, error is introduced into the process.

LEVEL l1. Recording Spontaneous

Speech2. Free Association3. Thinking-Aloud

LEVEL ll4. Random Sampling

of Thoughts5. Self-Monitoring Procedures

LEVEL lll6. Videotape Thought

Reconstruction7. Self-Statement Inventories8. Thought-Listing

LEVEL lV9. Clinical Interview

CONCURRENT UNSTRUCTURED

RETROSPECTIVE STRUCTURED

Self-Instruction Training1. Cognitive Modeling. The teacher performs a task while

talking aloud; the student observes.

2. Overt External Guidance. The student and teacher both perform the task while talking aloud together.

3. Overt Self-Guidance. The student performs the task using the same verbalizations as the teacher.

4. Faded Self-Guidance. The student whispers the instructions (often in an abbreviated form) while going through the task.

5. Covert Self-Guidance. The student performs the task, guided by covert self-speech.

Types of Self-Statements1. Problem Identification. “What is it I have to do?”

2. Focusing of Attention. “I have to concentrate, think only about my work.”

3. Planning and Response Guidance. “Be careful . . . Look at one at a time.”

4. Self-Reinforcement. “Good—I got it!”

5. Self-Evaluation. “Am I following my plan . . . Did I look at each one?”

6. Coping and Error-Correcting Option. “That’s OK . . . even if I make an error I an back up and go slowly.”

Levels of Self-Statements

• Task-approach statements refer to general strategies that can be used across a variety of related tasks.

• Task-specific statements refer to strategies that are specific to a particular task at hand.

Factors Influencing the Effectiveness of Self-Instructions

• If students have successfully used self-instructions in the past, they are more likely to use them again.

• The effectiveness of self-instructions will be affected by the cognitive ability of a child.

• Children are more likely to use self-instructions when they are targeted to the specific behavior to increase or decrease.

• Self-instructions do not teach student skills.• Students should be reinforced for using self-

instructions.

Attribution Retraining

Attribution retraining is based on the theory that a child’s causal explanations for why she is performing well or poorly have implications for her behavioral persistence, expectancies for future performance, and emotional reactions to success and failure.

Considerations for Using Attribution Retraining

• The teacher should tell a child that increased effort leads to success rather than believing that he is not sufficiently trying.

• A child should experience some success in order to increase the effectiveness of the self-statement “increased effort will lead to increased success.”

• The teacher should convey to a child that the self-statement will contribute to future success.

Thought Stopping

The goal of thought stopping is to help a child control unproductive or self-defeating thoughts and images by suppressing or eliminating them.

Usefulness of Thought Stopping

• Persons who ruminate about a past event that cannot be changed (“crying over spilled milk”)

• Persons who ruminate about an event that is unlikely to occur (e.g., being stuck b lightening)

• Persons who engage in repetitive, unproductive, negative thinking or repetitive anxiety-producing or self-defeating images

Situations to Avoid Thought Stopping

• It may not be appropriate for persons who have very intense and uncontrollable thoughts, such as those characterized by schizophrenia.

• Thoughts stopping seems to be more effective for persons with intermittent rather than continuous self-defeating thoughts.

Thought Stopping Steps

• Treatment Rationale• Practitioner-Directed Thought Stopping: Overt

Interruption• Child-Directed Thought Stopping: Overt

Interruption• Child-Directed Thought Stopping: Covert

Interruption• Shift to Assertive, Positive, or Neutral Thoughts• Homework and Follow-Up

Problem-Solving Thinking Skills

Problem Identification

Alternative Thinking

Consequential Thinking

Means-Ends Thinking

Problem-Solving Model

Problem Orientation

Problem Definition and Formulation

Generation of Alternative Solutions

Decision Making

Solution Implementation and Verification

Problem-Solving Steps and Questions

Steps QuestionsProblem identification What is the concern?

Goal selection What do I want?

Generation of alternatives What can I do?

Consideration of consequences What might happen?

Decision making What is my decision?

Implementation Now do it.

Evaluation Did it work?

Turtle Technique

• The teacher introduces the turtle response by selling the students a story.

• Students are taught muscle relaxation exercises.

• Problem solving is introduced through the use of role playing and discussion.

Rational-Emotive Therapy

Situation (activating event, antecedent)

Belief (meaning, interpretation)

Emotional Reaction

Behavioral Response

Irrational Thinking Styles

Demandingness

Awfulizing

I-can’t-stand-it-it’s

Condemning and Damning

The Sentence that Drops Out Emotional Pants

That event (whatever it was) shouldn’t have happened,its awful that it did, I can’t stand it, and somebodyaround here needs to be condemned and damned asrotten and worthless—let’s see, is it me, is it you, oris it the way the world works?

Physical Injury Scale

100% — worst 95% — 4 limbs cut off 90% — 3 limbs cut off 85% — 2 limbs cut off 80% — dominant arm cut off 75% — nondominant arm cut off 70% — 1 hand cut off 65% — 1 foot cut off 60% — 3 fingers cut off 55% — big toe cut off 50% — 3 broken limbs 45% — 2 broken limbs 40% — dominant arm broken 35% — nondominant arm broken 30% — broken nose 25% — badly sprained ankle 20% — laceration (6 stitches) 15% — cut 10% — bruise 5% — small bump 1% — gnat bite 0% —

The Sentence that Keeps Our Emotional Pants Up

That event (whatever it was) should have happened, and it’s about ____% bad, and I can stand a ____ ( )

Cognitive Therapy

• A child identifies dysfunctional thoughts and maladaptive assumptions that may be causing unpleasant emotions.

• Implementation of techniques to counteract the debilitating thought or dysfunctional assumption.

• A child is assigned homework assignments that require practice appropriate behaviors.