Do you want to talk about it?
Or in modern Americanese parlance, '...hey, do you guys
want to talk about it?'
No, je dit, no, no, no. Just pass me the computer.
Cognitive Bias Modification Therapy?
Cognitive Bias Modification, or CBM, is a revolutionary new computer-based therapy designed to reprogram your brain to avoid harmful cognitive biases that can cause a number of psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, depression and addiction.
It is well known that people suffering from social anxiety tend to focus more on threatening or disgusted faces than on friendly ones. This is a cognitive bias that has nothing to do with your conscious thought processes. It’s a pre-conscious thought pattern that you may now finally be able to change due to this revolutionary new therapy.
Colin MacLeod of the University of Western Australia, one of the pioneers of the technique, thinks CBM is not quite ready for general use. He would like to see it go through some large, long-term, randomised clinical trials of the sort that would be needed if it were a drug, rather than a behavioural therapy. Nevertheless, CBM does look extremely promising, if only because it offers a way out for those whose answer to the question, “Do you want to talk about it?” is a resounding “No”.
CBM is based on the idea that many psychological problems are caused by automatic, unconscious biases in thinking. People suffering from anxiety, for instance, may have what is known as an attentional bias towards threats: they are drawn irresistibly to things they perceive to be dangerous. Similar biases may affect memory and the interpretation of events. For example, if an acquaintance walks past without saying hello, it might mean either that he has ignored you or that he has not seen you. The anxious, according to the theory behind CBM, have a bias towards assuming the former and reacting accordingly.
Emily Holmes of Oxford University, who studies the use of CBM for depression, describes the process as like administering a cognitive vaccine. When challenged by reality in the form of, say, the unobservant friend, the recipient of the vaccine finds he is inoculated against inappropriate anxiety.
A study, conducted by Reinout Wiers of the University of Amsterdam and his colleagues, attempted to correct the approach bias to alcohol with CBM. The 214 participants received either a standard addiction treatment—a form of talk therapy—or the standard treatment plus four 15-minute sessions of CBM. In the first group, 41% of participants were abstinent a year later; in the second, 54%. That is not a cure for alcoholism, but it is a significant improvement on talk therapy alone.
Not all disorders are amenable to CBM. One study, by Hannah Reese (also at Harvard) and her colleagues, showed that it is ineffective in countering arachnophobia (perhaps not surprising, since this may be an evolved response, rather than an acquired one).
source The Economist http://www.economist.com/node/18276234
Colin MacLeod of the University of Western Australia, one of the pioneers of the technique, thinks CBM is not quite ready for general use. He would like to see it go through some large, long-term, randomised clinical trials of the sort that would be needed if it were a drug, rather than a behavioural therapy. Nevertheless, CBM does look extremely promising, if only because it offers a way out for those whose answer to the question, “Do you want to talk about it?” is a resounding “No”.
CBM is based on the idea that many psychological problems are caused by automatic, unconscious biases in thinking. People suffering from anxiety, for instance, may have what is known as an attentional bias towards threats: they are drawn irresistibly to things they perceive to be dangerous. Similar biases may affect memory and the interpretation of events. For example, if an acquaintance walks past without saying hello, it might mean either that he has ignored you or that he has not seen you. The anxious, according to the theory behind CBM, have a bias towards assuming the former and reacting accordingly.
Emily Holmes of Oxford University, who studies the use of CBM for depression, describes the process as like administering a cognitive vaccine. When challenged by reality in the form of, say, the unobservant friend, the recipient of the vaccine finds he is inoculated against inappropriate anxiety.
A study, conducted by Reinout Wiers of the University of Amsterdam and his colleagues, attempted to correct the approach bias to alcohol with CBM. The 214 participants received either a standard addiction treatment—a form of talk therapy—or the standard treatment plus four 15-minute sessions of CBM. In the first group, 41% of participants were abstinent a year later; in the second, 54%. That is not a cure for alcoholism, but it is a significant improvement on talk therapy alone.
Not all disorders are amenable to CBM. One study, by Hannah Reese (also at Harvard) and her colleagues, showed that it is ineffective in countering arachnophobia (perhaps not surprising, since this may be an evolved response, rather than an acquired one).
source The Economist http://www.economist.com/node/18276234
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