Cognitive theory

Any theory which is ‘cognitive’ refers to the mental processes and beliefs that an individual goes through when assessing a situation. For example, if you were walking to the bus stop and saw your bus coming, you would immediately believe that you must do something or you are going to miss it. You would then make a decision on whether or not it was worth running or if you should just let it go past and wait for the next one. Here, you have cognitively appraised the situation and made a decision based on your beliefs about what was happening and what you thought would happen.

The cognitive approach can be applied to any form of mental illness in determining its potential cause, although, as we see often in psychology, trying to find a single, definitive cause for any form of mental illness or for any form of behaviour is not as straightforward as it sounds.

How might the cognitive theory explain depression?

As we have seen, depression is a state where an individual experiences a period of low mood over a long period of time and its symptoms can be a feeling of worthlessness, little pleasure in any activity and an inability to carry out even the simplest of daily tasks.

The cognitive theory of depression maintains that the condition is brought about because individuals who experience it have biased, negative interpretations of their world. In other words, their thinking processes mean that they will usually assume that the worst possible scenario will happen in any event.

It is assumed that this type of thinking is some form of cognitive abnormality and may be brought about by negative schemas that people learn in childhood, which could be caused by:

• Parental neglect or abuse
• Criticism from teachers or peers
• Peer rejection.

A negative schema means that because a negative outcome has occurred once, this means that the person will naturally assume that it will happen again. So, if a child has been rejected by their peers, they may assume, as an adult, that others will reject them too so they isolate themselves to avoid the pain that this caused them the first time around.

Negative schemas can also lead to over generalisation, which means that individuals will draw big conclusions based on small pieces of information. For example, if an adult walks past their friend in the street, and the friend ignores them, someone who does not have negative schemas would almost certainly just assume that their friend has not seen them. Someone who does have negative schemas would immediately conclude that they had offended the friend in some way, they did not want to speak to them and that the friendship was over. This is also referred to as an error in logic as the person has not drawn a logical conclusion from the situation because they have focused on just one thing at the expense of the ‘big picture’.

Catastrophising is also common in people who have negative schemas. This refers to how an individual will assume the worst-case scenario in any given situation, such as in the table below:

Even though the thought processes on the right of the table above may seem extreme and possibly even ridiculous in some cases, these types of things are what depressed people tend to believe automatically because of their negative thought processes.

Beck’s negative triad

People who experience depression largely view themselves as inadequate and worthless; they see the world as a succession of negative events and their attitude is often defeatist, meaning they often will not even try to overcome the smallest of hurdles.

Aaron Beck identified what he referred to as a ‘negative triad’ of thinking, which occurs automatically in depressed people:

When these three factors interact with each other, this results in interference in normal cognitive processing because the thoughts occur automatically. This may well have been brought on by the negative schemas that are formed in childhood and which then predispose the individual to depression because of the way in which they view the world. Individuals with depression will continue to think in this way, even if there is a lot of evidence that their thinking is inaccurate.

Ellis’s ABC model

Ellis suggested that people may develop negative thought processes in three stages, which will eventually lead to depression because these thought processes become automatic:

• Activating event: something happens to a person which triggers feelings of uncertainty or anxiety, such as problems in a relationship
• Belief: these are the thoughts that the person associates with the event and can be either rational or irrational
• Consequence: if the person has a rational thought about something they will have positive emotional consequences – such as thinking that problems in a relationship can be resolved. However, if the thoughts are irrational, this will lead to negative emotional consequences – such as thinking that the relationship must be doomed and divorce is the only option. Consistent irrational thoughts are then, according to Ellis, what might lead to depression.

Strengths of the cognitive theory as an explanation for depression

• Some research does back up the findings of Beck. For example, Alloy et al. (1999) followed the thinking styles of young Americans in their early 20s for six years. Each participant’s thinking style was tested and they were placed in either the ‘positive thinking group’ or ‘negative thinking group’. After six years, it was found that just 1% of the positive thinking group developed depression compared to 17% of the negative thinking group. These results indicate there may be a link between cognitive style and development of depression
• The theory has been applied to cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which is a therapy that challenges irrational and negative thinking. This is thought to reduce the need for medication to treat depression.

Weaknesses of the cognitive theory as an explanation for depression

• The theory is reductionist, as it does not take into account any biological factors that may cause someone to develop depression
• A link between negative thinking and depression does not mean that one has necessarily caused the other, so cause and effect cannot be established – it may in fact be the case that depression causes negative thinking and not the other way around.