Unhelpful Thinking Styles
When we think about automatic thoughts, we can often place them into a number of common categories or styles of thinking that everyone engages in. When I say everyone, I mean everyone, not just people who struggle with depression. These ways of thinking are so common, in fact, that we have names for them.
One of the most commonly used styles of thinking is what we call “catastrophizing.” This is when your thoughts snowball. So for example, you start with the thought, “I’m going to fail this test”, which leads to the thought, “If I fail this test, I’ll fail this class,” and then, “I’ll fail out of college and never graduate,” and then, “I’ll never get a good job,” and finally, “I’ll be homeless and unable to support myself.” Notice how that went downhill pretty quickly. Sound familiar?
Click here for a list of different styles of thinking.
Take a minute to identify in some way (star, circle, or highlight, whatever works for you) the ones you tend to use. This may include all of them, it may be just a few.
Cross-Sectional Formulation
Let’s turn back to your cross-sectional formulation again (click here for a blank copy). Identify how the thoughts in the cognitive box fit into any of these unhelpful thinking categories. Write the unhelpful thinking style near the corresponding thought in the cognitive box on your worksheet.
As we discussed, these unhelpful thinking patterns can reinforce or trigger other depression symptoms. And as you may have noticed, we come back a lot to the interactions between thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and physical symptoms, and talk about how they each impact one another.