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Authors: David D. Burns
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be true.”
8. SHOULD STATEMENTS: You try to motivate yourself with shoulds and shouldn’ts, as if you had to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything. “Musts” and “oughts” are also offenders. The emotional consequence is guilt. When you direct should statements toward others, you feel anger, frustration, and resentment.
9. LABELING AND MISLABELING: This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself: “I’m a loser .” When someone else’s behavior rubs you the wrong way, you attach a negative label to him: “He’s a goddam louse.” Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded.
10. PERSONALIZATION: You see yourself as me cause of some negative external event which in fact you were not primarily responsible for.
----
1. You are a housewife, and your heart sinks when your husband has just complained disgruntledly that the roast beef was overdone. The following thought crosses your mind: “I’m a total failure. I can’t stand it! I never do anything right. I work like a slave and this is all the thanks I get! The jerk!” These thoughts cause you to feel sad and angry. Your distortions include one or more of the following:
a. all-or-nothing thinking;
b. overgeneralization;
c. magnification;
d. labeling;
e. all the above.
Now I will discuss the correct answers to this question so you can get some immediate feedback. Any answer(s) you might have circled was (were) correct. So if you circled anything , you were right! Here’s why. When you tell yourself, “I’m a total failure,” you engage in all-or-nothing thinking. Cut it out! The meat was a little dry, but that doesn’t make your entire life a total failure. When you think, “I never do anything right,” you are over generalizing . Never? Come on now! Not anything ? When you tell yourself, “I can’t stand it,” you are magnifying the pain you are feeling. You’re blowing it way out of proportion because you are standing it, and if you are , you can . Your husband’s grumbling is not exactly what you like to hear, but it’s nota reflection of your worth. Finally, when you proclaim, “I work like a slave and this is all the thanks I get! The jerk!” you are labeling both of you. He’s not a jerk , he’s just being irritable and insensitive. Jerky behavior exists, but jerks do not. Similarly, it’s silly to label yourself a slave . You’re just letting his moodiness sour your evening.
Okay, now let’s continue with the quiz.
2. You have just read the sentence in which I informed you that you would have to take this self-assessment quiz. Your heart suddenly sinks and you think, “Oh no, not other test! I always do lousy on tests. I’ll have to skip this section of the book. It makes me nervous, so it wouldn’t help anyway.” Your distortions include:
a. jumping to conclusions (fortune teller error);
b. overgeneralization;
c. all-or-nothing thinking;
d. personalization;
e. emotional reasoning.
3. You are a psychiatrist at the University of Pennsylvania. You are attempting to revise your manuscript on depression after meeting with your editor in New York. Although your editor seemed extremely enthusiastic, you notice you are feeling nervous and inadequate due to your thoughts, “They made a terrible mistake when they chose my book! I won’t be able to do a good job. I’ll never be able to make the book fresh, lively, and punchy. My writing is too drab, and my ideas aren’t good enough.” Your cognitive distortions include:
a. all-or-nothing thinking;
b. jumping to conclusions (negative prediction);
c. mental filter;
d. disqualifying the positive;
e. magnification.
4. You are lonely and you decide to attend a social affair for singles. Soon after you get there, you have the urge to leave because you feel anxious and defensive. The following thoughts run through
8. SHOULD STATEMENTS: You try to motivate yourself with shoulds and shouldn’ts, as if you had to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything. “Musts” and “oughts” are also offenders. The emotional consequence is guilt. When you direct should statements toward others, you feel anger, frustration, and resentment.
9. LABELING AND MISLABELING: This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself: “I’m a loser .” When someone else’s behavior rubs you the wrong way, you attach a negative label to him: “He’s a goddam louse.” Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded.
10. PERSONALIZATION: You see yourself as me cause of some negative external event which in fact you were not primarily responsible for.
----
1. You are a housewife, and your heart sinks when your husband has just complained disgruntledly that the roast beef was overdone. The following thought crosses your mind: “I’m a total failure. I can’t stand it! I never do anything right. I work like a slave and this is all the thanks I get! The jerk!” These thoughts cause you to feel sad and angry. Your distortions include one or more of the following:
a. all-or-nothing thinking;
b. overgeneralization;
c. magnification;
d. labeling;
e. all the above.
Now I will discuss the correct answers to this question so you can get some immediate feedback. Any answer(s) you might have circled was (were) correct. So if you circled anything , you were right! Here’s why. When you tell yourself, “I’m a total failure,” you engage in all-or-nothing thinking. Cut it out! The meat was a little dry, but that doesn’t make your entire life a total failure. When you think, “I never do anything right,” you are over generalizing . Never? Come on now! Not anything ? When you tell yourself, “I can’t stand it,” you are magnifying the pain you are feeling. You’re blowing it way out of proportion because you are standing it, and if you are , you can . Your husband’s grumbling is not exactly what you like to hear, but it’s nota reflection of your worth. Finally, when you proclaim, “I work like a slave and this is all the thanks I get! The jerk!” you are labeling both of you. He’s not a jerk , he’s just being irritable and insensitive. Jerky behavior exists, but jerks do not. Similarly, it’s silly to label yourself a slave . You’re just letting his moodiness sour your evening.
Okay, now let’s continue with the quiz.
2. You have just read the sentence in which I informed you that you would have to take this self-assessment quiz. Your heart suddenly sinks and you think, “Oh no, not other test! I always do lousy on tests. I’ll have to skip this section of the book. It makes me nervous, so it wouldn’t help anyway.” Your distortions include:
a. jumping to conclusions (fortune teller error);
b. overgeneralization;
c. all-or-nothing thinking;
d. personalization;
e. emotional reasoning.
3. You are a psychiatrist at the University of Pennsylvania. You are attempting to revise your manuscript on depression after meeting with your editor in New York. Although your editor seemed extremely enthusiastic, you notice you are feeling nervous and inadequate due to your thoughts, “They made a terrible mistake when they chose my book! I won’t be able to do a good job. I’ll never be able to make the book fresh, lively, and punchy. My writing is too drab, and my ideas aren’t good enough.” Your cognitive distortions include:
a. all-or-nothing thinking;
b. jumping to conclusions (negative prediction);
c. mental filter;
d. disqualifying the positive;
e. magnification.
4. You are lonely and you decide to attend a social affair for singles. Soon after you get there, you have the urge to leave because you feel anxious and defensive. The following thoughts run through
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