Depression AO1

• Behavioural characteristics: activity levels, disruption to sleep or eating, aggression and self harm.
• Cognitive characteristics: poor concentration, attending to or dwelling on the negative, absolutist thinking.
• Emotional characteristics: low mood, anger, low self esteem.
• Beck suggested depression was a result of cognitive vulnerability, which he split into three parts: faulty information processing, negative self scheme and the negative triad. Faulty information processing is attending to the negatives and ignoring positives, often characterised by black and white thinking. Negative self schema implies that the package of information a person has about themselves allows them to interpret everything about themselves negatively. This is caused by the negative triad.
• Beck suggested a person develops a dysfunctional view of themselves because of automatic thoughts- the negative triad. The three aspects of the triad are: negative view of the self ("I am worthless"), negative view of the future ("the economy will never get better"), and a negative view of the world ("the world is a cold, hard place"). However, negative view of the self also contributes to the emotional characteristic of low self esteem.
• Ellis described another cognitive explanation of depression, in which he proposed mental health conditions were a result of irrational thoughts (any thoughts preventing us from happiness and causing pain). To explain this he used the ABC model. Activating events are situations triggering irrational thoughts (failing of a test etc), beliefs are irrational. Some irrational beliefs he named include masturbation, utopianism, and i-can't-stand-it-itis. Whereas consequences are due to triggering and can be emotional or behavioural.