ABSTRACT
Once clients have elicited their negative automatic thoughts (NATs) and understood the differences between situations, thoughts and feelings, they are now ready to check their NATs in various ways to develop more helpful and adaptive responses to them. Beck et al. state that 'the therapist's major task is help the patient think of reasonable responses to his negative cognitions to differentiate between a realistic accounting of events and an accounting distorted by idiosyncratic meanings'. Some therapists, particularly those new to CBT, might believe that as soon as they hear a cognitive distortion in clients' accounts of their problems they have to challenge it immediately not letting their clients have their say: The unfortunate effect is that of micromanaging the clients' thinking and this can cause a strain in the therapeutic relationship. By contrast, competent CBT clinicians take some of the key comments their clients are making discussion to summarize the sorts of negative cognitive content that the clients are revealing.
