Dr. David Burns is a prominent psychologist and author with a lot to say about how our thoughts affect our mood and make us depressed and anxious. This idea, that thoughts influence how we feel, is central to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)--a well-studied and effective treatment modality used by therapists to help patients overcome depression and anxiety. A cognitive distortion is a term used within CBT to describe ways of thinking that aren’t consistent with reality and that aren’t conducive to the well-being of the person having the thoughts. By identifying these cognitive distortions and substituting them with positive ones, we can become happier and healthier individuals. After many years of seeing patients, Dr. Burns identified 12 common cognitive distortions that make people depressed and anxious.
All or nothing thinking: The person sees the world and situations as black or white, good or bad; there is no in-between. The person sees him or herself as either a total success or a total failure. For example, a student may get a few wrong answers on a test and think of himself as unintelligent. A person may not get the promotion she really wanted and consider herself a failure. This type of thinking is common among perfectionists.
Overgeneralization: A person has a few negative experiences and then sees life as mostly negative. For instance, a woman may witness a man being rude to his wife and then begin thinking that all men are rude. A man may hit every red light on his way to work and think that this always happens to him.
Mental filter: Good and bad things happen to everyone, but the person with the mental filter only focuses on the bad. A girl singing at a talent show may get a bunch of positive feedback from her friends and family, but receives one negative comment and dwells solely on what that person said while ignoring the positive.
Discounting the positive: This is similar to having a mental filter. A person will receive positive feedback or comments and brush them off, thinking they don’t matter or that the people giving the comments must be mistaken. A man may get a promotion at work but think that it was a fluke rather than hard work that got him the promotion.
Jumping to conclusions: This happens when a person reaches a negative conclusion based on no evidence to support it. There are two ways a person can jump to conclusions: mind reading and fortune-telling. When a person is mind reading, they are making the assumption that someone is thinking or reacting negatively towards them without verifying the truth. Fortune-telling happens when a person assumes that things will turn out badly no matter what he or she does.
Magnification: Magnification is when your life problems or personal shortcomings are exaggerated and the positive things are reduced to insignificance. This is similar to having a mental filter.
Emotional reasoning: Negative emotions reflect the way things actually are. For instance, you may be dissatisfied with your job, so your job must really be terrible. You may be angry with your friend and think that your friend must be a bad person.
Should statements: We often tell ourselves, or are told by others, that we should or shouldn’t do something or that we should or shouldn’t be a certain way. “I shouldn’t have made so many mistakes” is a classic example. Should implies that the world ought to be a certain way other than the way it is, but this simply isn’t the case. Obviously, we are going to make mistakes in life, so saying that we should make fewer mistakes goes against the way things actually are. People often use should statements as motivation but this usually backfires by making the person feel bad about him or herself.
Labeling: Labeling often works in conjunction with all or nothing thinking. When we fail or do something poorly, we may label ourselves as a “loser” or a “failure.” When our spouse says something mean, we may label them unfairly without trying to understand the root cause.
Personalization and blame: This occurs when a person holds him or herself responsible for something that was entirely out of their control. A woman might be having problems in her marriage and attribute those problems entirely to herself. The opposite can happen as well, when a person attributes blame entirely to someone else and fails to consider the role they played in the situation.
These cognitive distortions are partly or wholly responsible for why we feel depressed and anxious. Oftentimes, the person who thinks in this way is unaware of how their thinking affects them because they’ve been thinking in a distorted manner for so long. Dr. Burns suggests that we can break free from this cycle in a number of ways. The first step is to recognize when we are having a negative thought. Then, we can find alternative ways of thinking that are more consistent with reality and more conducive to our well-being. If we can make a habit of recognizing our negative thoughts and substituting them for neutral or positive ones, we will become happier individuals.