Cognitive Behavioral Therapy vs Psychotherapy: What’s the Difference?
Psyche is a complex phenomenon which requires an individual approach to its state and peculiarities. There are countless psychological schools, shrink methods, and psychotherapy schools which a regular person can be confused with.
Yet, the most affected struggle is held between Cognitive Behavioral Therapy vs psychotherapy. Both prove their efficiency, yet, there are still questions about is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy psychotherapy or not. The reason is simple because both methods struggle for clients and adepts, and both methods have blurred definitions which vary from state to state and from region to region.
If you are interested in a thorough analysis of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy the same as psychotherapy, or not, this article may help you navigate in a stormy yet helpful ocean of mental health care methods.
What is CBT? What’s the Essence of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Its Bright Sides for Patients?
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a type of psychotherapy that helps people learn to identify and change destructive or distressing thought patterns that negatively impact their behavior and emotions. This type of therapy focuses on changing automatic negative thoughts that can contribute to and worsen emotional difficulties, depression, and anxiety. These spontaneous negative thoughts have a detrimental effect on mood. With CBT, these thoughts are identified, challenged, and replaced with more objective, realistic thoughts. CBT is more than just identifying thought patterns! It focuses on using a wide range of strategies to help people overcome these thoughts. Such strategies may include journaling, role-playing activities, specific relaxation techniques, and mental distractions which help to avoid destructive thoughts. CBT includes a range of methods and approaches that target thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. These can range from structured psychotherapy to self-help materials.
The Main Distinctive Features or Why CBT Works Great?
The core concept of CBT is that thoughts and feelings play a fundamental role in human behavior.
The goal of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is to teach people that while they cannot control every aspect of the world around them, they can control how they interpret and act on things in their environment. It has become increasingly popular in recent years because of several of its benefits:
- By becoming aware of the negative and often unrealistic thoughts that dampen their feelings and mood, people start using healthier thinking patterns;
- CBT can be an effective short-term treatment option;
- The therapy can help people with certain types of emotional distress that do not require medication.
What Is Psychotherapy?
In the case of psychotherapy vs CBT there are no winners. Yet, there are distinctive features which separate one method from another. At once, you should consider that CBT is a kind of psychotherapy, namely, its talkative method. At once, the concept of psychotherapy itself is much deeper.
What is psychotherapy? That’s a concept applied for the sake of stabilization and improvement of the mental state of a person. Psychotherapy uses a wide toolkit of methods for restoring the mental balance of the individual, it treats mental and emotional problems. Existing methods are not universal ways of interacting with clients. Each meeting is individual and requires a personalized algorithm of actions. The main tasks of psychotherapy are as follows:
- Self-knowledge. During therapeutic sessions, the client learns how to understand his feelings the best way and analyze thoughts, motives for actions, and true desires.
- Exposing and correcting “negative” emotions. Most people suffering from psychosomatic diseases or neuroses strive to constantly restrain their “negative” emotions, refusing to release them. As a result of therapy, the patient learns to respond to the destructive impact of “negative emotions”.
- Behavior transformation. Psychotherapy involves the use of new behavior patterns to defend one’s interests and express one’s true feelings and emotions.
The Brightest Sides of Psychotherapy
The core benefits of psychotherapy include the opportunity to highlight and mitigate the symptoms of such crucial mental issues as depression, anxiety, multiple psych disorders and malfunctions. One more reason to apply for psychotherapy is to better understand your inner self. It promotes personal growth and development and helps to find new opportunities and ways for self-improvement.
What Is the Difference Between Psychotherapy and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Yet, if psychotherapy works in favor of the same things as CBT, what is the difference between CBT and psychotherapy? The secret is CBT is a more goal-focused method which is aimed at changing negative thoughts and behavioral patterns. Psychotherapy has wider application as it works both for similar goals and, beyond this, it suits patients with more complex issues like unresolved traumas and PTSD.
If talking about the maximum effectiveness, where are both approaches better to imply?
- For Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, which is often called a gold standard of psychotherapy [1], the main scope of application is as follows: curing most cases of anxiety, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, various phobias, and depression issues. It was also proved that CBT is effective versus Borderline Personality Disorder [2]
- For psychotherapy, the scope of application is even wider. The main difference is that psychotherapy proves its effectiveness for various mental state issues like the same depression, ADHD, PTSD, bipolar disorder, and dozens of others. You should consider that psychotherapy varies greatly; thus, when you ask about psychotherapy, you should understand it has various methods and types in its stash.
The Main Types of Psychotherapy
As APA claims [3], the range of methods included into psychotherapeutic approach consists of:
- Psychoanalysis which focuses on changes in the problematic behaviors by seeking for their roots in the past experience of a person.
- Psychodynamic methods refer to the development of feeling, thoughts, motivations, changing them to a healthier and more realistic way.
- Behavior therapy initiated by professor I.P. Pavlov and its descendants, Desensitizing theory, Operant conditioning, and namely, CBT, focus on behavioral patterns and their improvements for the sake of overall well-being of a patient.
- Cognitive therapy is another side of CBT. While CBT focuses on behavior and thinking both, cognitive therapy possesses mental dysfunctions as a result of negative thinking more than of a negative behavior.
- Humanistic therapy focuses on rational choices and critical thinking as the way for clear mind and healthy mental state.
- Integrative/holistic therapy is the combo of these methods or, sometimes, a custom approach which includes other methods of investigation and remedy.
What Are the Similarities?
As for the similarities, they are simple. Both CBT and psychotherapy pursue the same goal, to maintain the healthy mental state of the individual. Besides, psychotherapy should be considered as a whole, and Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy is a part of this whole.
How Do I Know If CBT or Traditional Psychotherapy Is Right for Me?
The best thing you can do if you are concerned about your mental state is to apply for the help of specialists. This also concerns the type of therapy or the combo of methods which can be the most effective in your care.
So, if you are not an M.D. degree, the best is to trust the choice of the therapy to professional. In case you are not content with the attitude, the levels of service or the pricing and insurance coverage, you can simply turn to URP Behavioral Health center. In our facility, the best CBT specialists and psychotherapists work together to provide each patient with top-quality life free from various mental disorders symptoms.
So, if you are not sure whether CBT works for you tip-top, better apply for additional evaluation and prescriptions from our medical advisors. And if you look for a center for cognitive behavioral psychotherapy to start your way to a healthy mental state, it is URP Behavioral Health you can rely on.
