Best Licensed Psychologist In New York and Florida

  Maybe a friend’s recommended it or you’ve read about it in the New York Times. What is cognitive therapy any way and what’s all the hype about? Cognitive Therapy was created by University of Pennsylvania psychiatrist Aaron Beck in the 1960s. At the time it was created, cognitive therapy marked a radical departure from the dominant therapy, namely psychoanalysis. Interestingly, Dr. Beck was in fact trained in psychoanalysis and developed cognitive therapy in the course of testing the psychoanalytic theory of depression—anger turned against the self. While interviewing depressed patients Dr. Beck observed distinctive thinking styles and thought patterns rather than self-directed anger. The beliefs of these depressed individuals about the self, the world, and the future were negative and overly general, e.g., “Nothing ever works out,” “My life is a mess.” These negative thoughts, in turn, prompted negative emotions such as sadness and anger. Thoughts like “things will never change” ...