Cognitive behavioral therapy for depression

Abstract

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a form of psychotherapy which improves dysfunctional cognition and enhances the ability to manage problems in daily life. In late 1980s, CBT came to receive much attention and is now covered by the national health insurance in Japan. In this paper, the author explained the basic concepts of CBT, and described how to use the several CBT techniques, such as behavior activation, cognitive restructuring, problem solving, in a daily clinical settings and how to treat patients effectively by combining CBT and pharmachotherapy. For cognitive restructuring, for example, patients rethink his/her automatic thoughts and develop functional thoughts. This process helps the patient to separate their problems from themselves, deal with them in an objective manner, and replace dysfunctional thoughts with realistic and adaptive thoughts. It is also suggested that it would be useful to use Web-based CBT program which helps patient to examine automatic thoughts and generate functional thoughts.