Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
One of the more contemporary approaches to counselling or psychological therapy is the rational emotive behaviour therapy, proposed by Albert Ellis. This approach focuses on the interplay between cognition, emotion and behaviours. It is grounded on the main principle that people also cause their own psychological problems with their own interpretation or perception of different events and situations. Likewise, a redesign or modification of a person’s personal statements can also produce to a redesign or modification of behaviour.
This therapeutic approach emphasizes the importance of a warm and collaborative dialogue between the therapist and the client. It also stresses out that psychological problems are more dominantly caused by discrepancies in one’s own thinking. Therefore, this helping method is more specific and identifies specific structured target problems for the therapy sessions. Similar to other cognitive behavioural techniques, this method also includes homework, further encouraging personal responsibility, initiative and commitment from the client. It also makes the client feel more active and more in control.
According to the rational emotive behaviour therapy, individuals possess both rational and irrational beliefs. These beliefs include the helpful ones such as happiness, optimism, love, aim for growth and development, as well as the unhelpful ones such as self-destruction, self-blames procrastination and repetition of mistakes or failures. Thus, it is considered another significant goal of this therapy to guide the client to accept that though he or she fails at one point or another, he or she can also end up victorious in other areas.
The main process followed by the rational emotive behaviour therapy is the ABC theory of personality. It states that A (the activating event) does not really cause C (the psychological consequence), in the way we expect it does. Instead, a person’s B (belief) about the activating event is the factor that causes the consequence.
You can also acquire more information on REBT from the Association for Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy website, www.arebt.org.
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