lient continues to be educated about his/her presenting problem and learns new adaptive coping skills.During the third task, the therapist helps the clients reconceptualize their problems in a more hopeful fashion. In this step, the therapist enables his/her clients to reorganize their thought processes of their predicaments in problem-solving-oriented terms that will lend them to helpful solutions. Meichenbaum (1996) stresses the important role of hope by observing that clients seeking cognitive-behavioral treatment demonstrated a 60% to 80% symptomatic alleviation of depression within the first four therapy sessions due to reconceptualizing their stories. This occurred well before the usual introduction of techniques specific to the treatment of depression, such as cognitive restructuring. However, reconceptualizing or reframing a problem alone rarely helps clients achieve the functional level they seek (Meichenbaum, 1996).The fourth task of therapy is ensuring that clients attain the necessary coping skills. In this step, the therapist teaches clients a variety of intrapersonal and interpersonal coping skills to help them manage problematic situations. These skills include: self-monitoring, relaxation retraining, self-instructional training, cognitive restructuring, assertiveness training, and relapse prevention skills. Cognitive restructuring procedures are designed to modify the client’s thinking and the premises, assumptions, and attitudes underlying the client’s thoughts (Meichenbaum, 1977).The goal of self-instructional training is to teach impulsive clients to spontaneously provide themselves with inhibitory cues at incipient stages (Meichenbaum, 1977). Meichenbaum and Goodman (1971) provide evidence that cognitive self-instructional training was successful in decreasing impulsive responding, confirming that when a client utilizes self-instructions, behavior change occurs and treatment effectiveness is enhanced. If ...
