ABSTRACT
Cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) clients are, ideally, expected to give detailed information about their problems; fill out inventories to get baseline measures about severity of their presenting problems; detect their dysfunctional thinking and its relationship to their emotional distress; fill in forms to find and distinguish between situations, thoughts and feelings; use reason and reality testing to challenge dysfunctional thinking; negotiate, carry out and review homework assignments; and give feedback on their learning and experiences of therapy. At first blush, this seems like a highly intellectual endeavour that only the most intelligent and articulate clients benefit. However, as Aaron T. Beck observe, high intelligence is not required from either the client or therapist. The important point is that the therapist adapts CBT to the intellectual and verbal abilities of each client. CBT effective with clients from different social and educational backgrounds and adapted for working with, among others, older people, learning disabilities, children and young people, and adult male offenders.
