explanations of depression

what was Aaron Beck's explanation to depression?

• suggested there's a cognitive explanation to why some people are more vulnerable to depression than others

• suggested 3 parts to this cognitive vulnerability: faulty information processing, negative self schemas, negative triad

faulty information processing

• Beck believed depressed people make fundamental errors in logic and tend to selectively attend to the negative aspects of a situation and ignore the positive aspects

• tendency to blow small problems out of proportion with black and white thinking and ignoring the middle ground eg you're a success or failure rather than good at some things but okay at others

negative self schemas

• a schema is a building block of knowledge, a 'package' of ideas and information developed with experience, self schemas are a package of ideas we have about ourselves

• depressed people have developed a negative self schema so interpret all the information about themselves in a negative way

negative triad

Beck built on the idea of maladaptive responses, suggested people with depression get trapped in a cycle of negative thoughts, often view themselves, the world and the future pessimistically

• negative view of the self eg I'm incompetent and underserving

• negative view of the world eg its a hostile place

• negative view of the future eg problems won't disappear, they'll always be emotional pain

what was Albert Ellis' explanation to depression?

• proposed good mental health is the result of rational thinking

• argues there are common irrational beliefs that underlie much depression which sufferers have based their lives on eg I must be successful in everything I do to consider myself worthwhile

Ellis (1962) ABC model

A: an activating event causes (irrational beliefs from negative event)

B: an individuals beliefs resulting in

C: a consequence (emotional and behavioural)

• if beliefs are subject to cognitive biases they can cause irrational thinking which may produce undesirable behaviours

strength of Beck's explanation- supporting research

• Clark + Beck (1999) concluded cognitive vulnerabilities eg faulty information processing, negative self schema are more common in depressed people

• a recent prospective study by Cohen et al. (2019) tracked 473 adolescents development and found early cognitive vulnerability predicted later depression

• shows there's an association between cognitive vulnerability and depression

strength of Beck's explanation- real world application screening for depression

• assessing cognitive vulnerability in young people most at risk of developing depression means they can be monitored

• understanding cognitive vulnerability is applied to CBT to alter cognitions underlying depression, making a person more resilient to life events

• means the idea of cognitive vulnerability is useful in clinical practice

limitation of Beck's explanation- partial explanation

• depressed people show particular patterns of cognition, even before depression, so Beck's idea of cognitive vulnerability is at least a partial explanation

• however, some aspects of depression aren't explained by cognitive factors eg experiences of extreme anger and for some people, hallucinations and delusions

• suggests the cognitive model isn't a very good explanation for all depressive phenomena

strength of Ellis' explanation- application in treating depression

• Ellis applied the ABC model to treat depression (rational emotive behaviour therapy, REBT)

• evidence that REBT can both change negative beliefs and relieve the symptoms of depression (David et al. 2018)

• means that REBT has real world value

limitation of Beck's explanation- only explains reactive depression

• reactive depression describes a form of depression triggered by negative activating events

• however, in many cases it isn't obvious what triggers depression, endogenous depression, Ellis' model is less useful in explaining this

• means Ellis' model can only explain some cases of depression

evaluation of Beck's explanation- ethical issues

• the ABC model of depression located responsibility for depression with the depressed person, critics see this as blaming them

• however, the application of the ABC model to REBT appears to make at least some depressed people achieve more resilience and feel better

• means REBT gives reason for concern but can be ethically acceptable as long as its carried out sensitively to avoid victim blaming