AO3

• Irrational beliefs

  May be realistic
• Limitation of the cognitive approach


  • Not all irrational beliefs are 'irrational', they may simply seem irrational
• Alloy and Abramson (1979) suggest that depressive realists tend to see things for what they are (with normal people tending to view the world through rose-coloured glasses)
• Depressed people gave more accurate estimates of the likelihood of a disaster than 'normal' controls, and this was called the sadder but wiser effect
• These doubts about whether irrational thinking really is irrational raise questions about the value of the cognitive approach