by DK
"The Blank Slate… promised to make racism, sexism, and class prejudice factually untenable."
Steven Pinker
See also: Francis Galton • Konrad Lorenz • Roger Brown • John Bowlby • Noam Chomsky
IN CONTEXT
APPROACH
Cognitive behavioral therapy
BEFORE
1950s Joseph Wolpe applies behaviorist ideas to clinical psychology in techniques such as systematic desensitization.
1952 Behavior and personality theorist Hans J. Eysenck causes controversy with claims that psychotherapy has no beneficial effect.
1955 Albert Ellis offers an alternative to traditional psychotherapy with his Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT).
1960s Aaron Beck questions whether psychoanalytical therapy is effective; he goes on to develop cognitive therapy.
AFTER
2000s Cognitive behavioral therapy becomes a standard treatment for anxiety, panic attacks, and other disorders.
The second half of the 20th century saw a profound change in clinical psychology. Psychoanalysis was seen by many psychologists as less than scientific, and by the 1960s it was replaced as the treatment for some disorders by behaviorist therapies, or the newer cognitive therapy developed by Aaron Beck. Combinations of these approaches, under the umbrella term cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), evolved in the 1980s, pioneered in Britain by Paul Salkovskis. CBT, he found, was especially successful in treating obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD); where psychoanalysis had failed to find a root cause for the disorder in repression or past trauma, Salkovskis explained the problem in terms of cognitive psychology, and offered a cognitive and behavioral treatment.
Obsessive thoughts
Salkovskis suggests that obsessive-compulsive disorder has its basis in the sort of unwelcome and intrusive thoughts that we all have from time to time—the idea that something terrible is about to happen, or that we will suffer or cause some awful misfortune. Most of the time, we can put these thoughts out of our minds and carry on with life, but sometimes they are more difficult to shake off. At the extreme end of the scale, the thoughts become obsessive and bring with them a feeling of dread and responsibility. People predisposed to these kinds of obsessive thoughts find it difficult to make a rational appraisal of their importance, and overestimate not only any risk of harm, but also the amount of control they have to prevent it. Obsessive thoughts of catching and passing on a deadly disease, for example, may result in compulsive cleaning or hand washing. There is also a feeling of a responsibility to act, even if the action is out of proportion to the risk. The resulting compulsive actions can become ritual behavior patterns, carried out repeatedly in an attempt to gain control over a perceived threat.
Cognitive behavioral therapy combines cognitive and behavioral techniques to address both the cause and the symptoms of OCD to great effect. First, the patient is helped through cognitive therapy to recognize the obsessional thoughts for what they are, making a more rational appraisal of the risk and, crucially, of how much responsibility he or she has for taking preventative action. This cognitive approach helps reduce the distress. Alongside this, behavioral therapy techniques, such as desensitization (gradual exposure to the perceived threat) help the patient to control his or her compulsive behavior. Salkovskis uses CBT techniques to successfully treat anxiety, panic attacks, and phobias.
Compulsive activities such as repeated hand washing may be an attempt to control intrusive thoughts. Shakespeare’s Lady Macbeth is driven by guilt to continually wash her hands.
PAUL SALKOVSKIS
A graduate of the Institute of Psychiatry, London in 1979, Paul Salkovskis took up a post at the University of Oxford in 1985 to research panic disorders. His interest in the application of cognitive theory to anxiety disorders led to his appointment as a Senior Fellow and later as Professor of Cognitive Psychology.
While at Oxford, the emphasis of his work moved to the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder using cognitive behavioral therapy. In 2000, he became Professor of Clinical Psychology and Applied Science at the Institute of Psychiatry, and Clinical Director in the Center for Anxiety Disorders and Trauma. Since 2010, Salkovskis has been based at the University of Bath, where he is establishing a specialist CBT research and treatment center.
Key works
1998 Panic Disorder
1999 Understanding and Treating Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
2000 Causing Harm and Allowing Harm (with A. Wroe)
See also: Joseph Wolpe • Fritz Perls • Albert Ellis • Aaron Beck
INTRODUCTION
As psychology became established as a scientific discipline, its scope was at first limited to the examination of the mind and its workings, before broadening to include the study of behavior. For much of the first half of the 20th century, this meant the emphasis was very much on a study of the mind and behavior of individuals and their responses to their environment, though it became increasing clear to some psychologists that “the environment” includes other people.
The field of social psychology emerged in the 1930s, when psychologists began to explore the interactions of individuals within groups and society as a whole. They examined the effect of social organizations on the individual, and the way that social structures are influenced by the psychology of their individual members. Social psychologists, as they were called, also studied the relationships between individuals within these groups and between different groups. This introduced a new set of topics to psychology, including group dynamics, attitudes, and prejudice, as well as social conflict, conformity, obedience, and social change.
Social environment
Among the first to make a systematic study of the psychology of social groups was German—American Kurt Lewin, considered the “father of social psychology.” Lewin took a fresh look at the dominant behaviorist approach, examining how behavior results from the interaction between the individual and his environment, as well as the nature of that environment. In his studies of small groups, he laid the foundations for later examinations of group dynamics and how groups and their members bring about change.
Behaviorism fell out of favor after World War II, and Lewin’s ideas about the effect of the social environment provided an alternative that was enthusiastically taken up by the next generation. The concept of “attribution”—the way we see and interpret the behavior of others—became an area of specific research, and from that came theories of conformity and cultural norms such as those of Solomon Asch. Erving Goffman’s best-known theory—that we act out certain behaviors to suit the impression we want to give to others—also came out of this new emphasis on the importance of social interaction.
Research in the 1960s shed light on the darker aspects of behavior; Melvin Lerner showed how victims are sometimes blamed for what happens to them, and Elliot Aronson explained that apparently aberrant behavior could be the result of circumstances rather than insanity. More controversially, especially at a time when the atrocities of World War II were still fresh in people’s minds, experiments by Stanley Milgram and Philip Zimbardo showed just how far the need to obey and conform affects our behavior.
Applying psychology
The advent of cognitive psychology brought a new influence on social psychology. The effects of cognitive processes such as memory and emotion were highlighted by Roger Brown and Robert Zajonc, and these findings were exploited widely by the mass media and advertising, which began to play an increasingly important role in modern society. Mass media and advertising in turn had a growing effect on social structures, prompting theories of soc
ial constructivism by psychologists such as Serge Moscovici.
As a result, social psychology has rapidly become more applicable to many different situations. It has influenced other areas of psychology—in particular psychotherapy, through William Glasser’s “reality therapy.” It has also impacted on other disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, and even politics and economics. The 1960s saw the rise of the civil rights movement and feminism, both of which challenged the status quo. Issues surrounding prejudice, cultural norms, and beliefs came to the fore, and the work of social psychologists such as Janet Taylor Spence did much to alter attitudes toward women, while others used Lewin’s process of social transformation to bring about organizational changes. Theories and models pioneered by social psychologists are now used by business, industry, and all kinds of social organizations, and more recently have been adopted as a means of achieving social and political reform in societies suffering from oppression, most notably in the “Liberation Psychology” espoused by Ignacio Martín-Baró.
IN CONTEXT
APPROACH
Field theory
BEFORE
Early 1900s Sigmund Freud and other psychotherapists argue that human behavior is a result of past experience.
1910s Wolfgang Köhler, among other Gestalt psychologists, argues that people must be understood holistically, according to all of their elements and their interactions with the surrounding environment.
AFTER
1958 In The Dynamics of Planned Change, Ronald Lippitt, Jeanne Watson, and Bruce Westley create a seven-step change theory that focuses on the role of the change agent rather than on the evolution of change itself.
The behaviorists believed that behavior is dictated by the environment alone, but in the 1920s Kurt Lewin made the claim that behavior is a result of both the individual and the environment. His revolutionary ideas developed and evolved into the study of group dynamics that is invaluable to organizations today.
In his investigation of human behavior, Lewin developed field theory, which explores the forces and factors that influence any given situation. Lewin’s “field” refers to the psychological environment of the individual or the collective group at a particular point in time, and he identified two opposing forces present in any given field: helpful forces, which drive people toward achieving their goals, and hindering forces, which inhibit movement toward these goals.
"A person who has learned to see how much his own fate depends upon the fate of his entire group will be eager to take over a fair share of responsibility for its welfare."
Kurt Lewin
Lewin’s change model
Field theory provided the basis for Lewin’s model of change, which offers an invaluable guide for successful transformation, both for individuals and organizations. The model shows that in order to carry out the process of change successfully, a person or organization leader must take into account the various influences at play both within the minds of individuals and within their environment.
In explaining his change model, Lewin emphasizes that the entire situation, including all the relevant personal and environmental details, must be taken into account, as focusing on isolated facts can lead to a skewed perception of the circumstances. Not only must you have a thorough and holistic understanding of a situation in order to change it, but that understanding actually deepens throughout the change process, and therefore “you cannot understand a system until you try to change it.”
Lewin’s model describes a three-step process for achieving personal or organizational transformation. The first stage—which he called “unfreezing”—involves preparing by recognizing that change is necessary, and dismantling old beliefs and practices. Change occurs in the second stage, and is often accompanied by confusion and distress as the old mindset or system breaks down. The third and final stage, “freezing,” occurs when a new mindset is crystallized and there is an accompanying sense of comfort and stability within the new framework. The process is difficult because it involves painful unlearning, difficult relearning, and the restructuring of thoughts, feelings, attitudes, and perceptions.
"We all need each other. This type of interdependence is the greatest challenge to the maturity of individual and group functioning."
Kurt Lewin
Successful organizational change is engendered by making a unique diagnosis of the people and situational forces involved, and understanding the interplay between them.
Unfreezing beliefs
The unfreezing stage is perhaps the most complex stage of the process, as people are naturally inclined to resist changes to their established mindsets and routines. It requires careful preparation; many change efforts within organizations fail simply because employees are not adequately prepared, making them more resistant to change and less likely to function effectively under the new system. Preparation might include creating an exciting vision for change that employees can rally around, communicating it effectively, developing a sense of urgency and necessity for change, providing employees with support, and allowing them to participate actively in the process.
On an individual level, people may react to this stage defensively, not wanting to leave their comfort zone and undergo the challenge of learning new skills or accepting a new set of beliefs. This natural resistance can be overcome if the individual is helped to accept that the change is necessary, valid, and will lead to the best outcome, and if support is given to engender a feeling of psychological safety.
Lewin demonstrated the positive effect of creating an environment of psychological safety during the unfreezing stage (and of allowing active participation in the change process) in his efforts to convince American housewives to serve animal organs as food at home during World War II. Historically, offal had only been eaten by low-income families, but the American government wanted to ensure that nutritious food was not going to waste during a time of food shortages, especially as kidneys, livers, and hearts are all high-protein foods. The US Department of Agriculture called upon Lewin to help convince housewives to include these meats in their family meals. During interviews with housewives, Lewin realized that there were both helpful and hindering forces at play. The helpful forces, or incentives, toward changing the housewives’ view of organ meat was its high nutritional value. The hindering forces, or barriers, to change centered around the women’s view that the meat was inappropriate for them and their families, and to a lesser degree, that it would not taste good.
Lewin set up a study using two groups of housewives to explore the best ways of initiating change. The first group was told repeatedly that eating offal was beneficial for them, while the other group took part in a small group discussion focusing on how the food shortage problem could be eased if women like themselves could be convinced to take part in a program of using secondary cuts of meat such as livers, kidneys, and hearts. When around one-third of the women who had participated in the discussion group later served offal for dinner, Lewin concluded that increasing the level of people’s involvement also increases the likelihood of changing their attitudes and behaviors. Lecturing to the first group had proved ineffective, but in the discussion group he had created an environment in which women felt psychologically safe enough to express their concerns and opinions. Through exploring their beliefs as well as the realities of the food shortages, he helped them change their opinions about which meats were edible and guided them toward a new belief: that offal is acceptable to buy and serve at home.
"Learning is more effective when it is an active rather than a passive process.
"
Kurt Lewin
During World War II, housewives were encouraged to change many of their beliefs, from the types of food and clothing that were acceptable to their capability to do “men’s jobs.”
Making the change
During Lewin’s second stage—the actual change process—people are confronted with the daunting and confusing task of implementing a new system. They must give up familiar routines and practices and master new skills (which itself can arouse feelings of uncertainty or a fear of failure). In an organization, the new system will be defined by the leadership, and often relates to technology, structure, procedures, or culture. It is important at this stage to provide sufficient support for employees and ensure the elimination of obstacles.
