Psychoanalysis, pioneered by Sigmund Freud, dominates popular impressions of therapy. Patients lying down on long couches while an analyst dissects their dreams for evidence of repressed childhood trauma make for great television, but does it actually work?<\/p>\n
In the late 1950s, Aaron Beck<\/a>, a practicing psychoanalyst, decided to test a key concept of Freudian theory. Psychoanalysts explained depression as a masochistic drive\u2014hostility turned inward toward the self. If that were so, Beck would expect those themes to show up in patients\u2019 dreams.<\/p>\n However, when he scrutinized these dreams, he didn\u2019t find masochistic imagery. In fact, his patients had fewer<\/em> hostile images. Instead, he found themes of loss and rejection.<\/p>\n This failure of Freudian theory triggered Beck to question his entire discipline\u2019s assumptions. If the theory\u2019s basic tenets couldn\u2019t be demonstrated in experiments, how useful was psychoanalysis?<\/p>\n Cognitive therapy was born out of this failure. In the decades since Beck\u2019s pioneering work, this mode of therapy has proven one of the most effective practices<\/a> for treating depression, anxiety and many other psychological afflictions. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) often outperforms pharmaceutical drugs alone, and it has become the gold standard<\/a> for psychotherapy.<\/p>\nWhat is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy?<\/h2>\n
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