Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT), previously called rational therapy and

rational emotive therapy, is a comprehensive, active-directive, philosophically and

empirically based psychotherapy which focuses on resolving emotional and
behavioral problems and disturbances and enabling people to lead happier and
more fulfilling lives.[1] REBT was created and developed by the American
psychotherapist and psychologist Albert Ellis who was inspired by many of the
teachings of Asian, Greek, Roman and modern philosophers.[2][3] REBT is one form
of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) and was first expounded by Ellis in the mid1Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT), previously called rational therapy and
rational emotive therapy, is a comprehensive, active-directive, philosophically and
empirically based psychotherapy which focuses on resolving emotional and
behavioral problems and disturbances and enabling people to lead happier and
more fulfilling lives.[1] REBT was created and developed by the American
psychotherapist and psychologist Albert Ellis who was inspired by many of the
teachings of Asian, Greek, Roman and modern philosophers.[2][3] REBT is one form
of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) and was first expounded by Ellis in the mid1950s; development continued until his death in 2007950s; development continued
until his death in 2007REBT argues that mental wellness and mental health to a
large degree results from an adequate amount of self-helping, flexible, logicoempirical ways of thinking, emoting and behaving.[15] When a perceived undesired
and stressful activating event occurs, and the individual is interpreting, evaluating
and reacting to the situation rationally and self-helpingly, then the resulting
consequence is, according to REBT, likely to be more healthy, constructive and
functional. This does not by any means mean that a relatively un-disturbed person
never experiences negative feelings, but REBT does hope to keep debilitating and
un-healthy emotions and subsequent self-defeating behavior to a minimum. To do
this REBT generally promotes a flexible, un-dogmatic, self-helping and efficient
belief system and constructive life philosophy about adversities and human desires
and preferences.
REBT clearly acknowledges that people, in addition to disturbing themselves, also
are innately constructivists. Because they largely upset themselves with their
beliefs, emotions and behaviors, they can be helped to, in a multimodal manner,
dispute and question these and develop a more workable, more self-helping set of
constructs.
REBT generally teaches and promotes:
That the concepts and philosophies of life of unconditional self-acceptance, otheracceptance, and life-acceptance are effective philosophies of life in achieving
mental wellness and mental health.
That human beings are inherently fallible and imperfect and that they had better
accept their and other human being's totality and humanity, while at the same time
not like some of their behaviors and characteristics. That they are better off not

measuring their entire self or their "being" and give up the narrow, grandiose and
ultimately destructive notion to give themselves any global rating or report card.
This is partly because all humans are continually evolving and are far too complex
to accurately rate; all humans do both self-defeating / socially defeating and selfhelping / socially helping deeds, and have both beneficial and un-beneficial
attributes and traits at certain times and in certain conditions. REBT holds that ideas
and feelings about self-worth are largely definitional and are not empirically
confirmable or falsifiable.
That people had better accept life with its hassles and difficulties not always in
accordance with their wants, while trying to change what they can change and live
as elegantly as possible with what they cannot change.
REBT Intervention[edit]
As explained, REBT is a therapeutic system of both theory and practices; generally
one of the goals of REBT is to help clients see the ways in which they have learned
how they often needlessly upset themselves, teach them how to "un-upset"
themselves and then how to empower themselves to lead happier and more
fulfilling lives.[11] The emphasis in therapy is generally to establish a successful
collaborative therapeutic working alliance based on the REBT educational model.
Although REBT teaches that the therapist or counsellor had better demonstrate
unconditional other-acceptance or unconditional positive regard, the therapist is not
necessarily always encouraged to build a warm and caring relationship with the
client. The tasks of the therapist or counselor include understanding the clients
concerns from his point of reference and work as a facilitator, teacher and
encourager.
In traditional REBT, the client together with the therapist, in a structured activedirective manner, often work through a set of target problems and establish a set of
therapeutic goals. In these target problems, situational dysfunctional emotions,
behaviors and beliefs are assessed in regards to the client's values and goals. After
working through these problems, the client learns to generalize insights to other
relevant situations. In many cases after going through a client's different target
problems, the therapist is interested in examining possible core beliefs and more
deep rooted philosophical evaluations and schemas that might account for a wider
array of problematic emotions and behaviors.[13] Although REBT much of the time
is used as a brief therapy, in deeper and more complex problems, longer therapy is
promoted.
In therapy, the first step often is that the client acknowledges the problems, accepts
emotional responsibility for these and has willingness and determination to change.
This normally requires a considerable amount of insight, but as originator Albert
Ellis[16] explains:

"Humans, unlike just about all the other animals on earth, create fairly sophisticated
languages which not only enable them to think about their feeling, their actions,
and the results they get from doing and not doing certain things, but they also are
able to think about their thinking and even think about thinking about their
thinking."
Through the therapeutic process, REBT employs a wide array of forceful and active,
meaning multimodal and disputing, methodologies. Central through these methods
and techniques is the intent to help the client challenge, dispute and question their
destructive and self-defeating cognitions, emotions and behaviors. The methods
and techniques incorporate cognitive-philosophic, emotive-evocative-dramatic, and
behavioral methods for disputation of the client's irrational and self-defeating
constructs and helps the client come up with more rational and self-constructive
ones. REBT seeks to acknowledge that understanding and insight are not enough; in
order for clients to significantly change, they had better pinpoint their irrational and
self-defeating constructs and work forcefully and actively at changing them to more
functional and self-helping ones.
REBT posits that the client must work hard to get better, and in therapy this
normally includes a wide array of homework exercises in day-to-day life assigned by
the therapist. The assignments may for example include desensitization tasks, i.e.,
by having the client confront the very thing he or she is afraid of. By doing so, the
client is actively acting against the belief that often is contributing significantly to
the disturbance.
Another factor contributing to the brevity of REBT is that the therapist seeks to
empower the client to help himself through future adversities. REBT only promotes
temporary solutions if more fundamental solutions are not found. An ideal
successful collaboration between the REBT therapist and a client results in changes
to the client's philosophical way of evaluating himself or herself, others, and his or
her life, which will likely yield effective results. The client then moves toward
unconditional self-acceptance, other-acceptance and life-acceptance while striving
to live a more self-fulfilling and happier life.
Efficacy[edit]
REBT and CBT in general have a substantial and strong research base to verify and
support both their psychotherapeutic efficiency and their theoretical underpinnings.
A great quantity of scientific empirical studies has proven REBT to be an effective
and efficient treatment for many kinds of psychopathology, conditions and
problems.[16][18][19][20] A vast amount of outcome and experimental studies
support the effectiveness of REBT and CBT.[21][22] Recently, REBT randomized
clinical trials have offered a positive view on the efficacy of REBT.[23]
In general REBT is arguably one of the most investigated theories in the field of
psychotherapy and a large amount of clinical experience and a substantial body of

modern psychological research have validated and substantiated many of REBTs

theoretical assumptions on personality and psychotherapy.[19][23][24]
Limitations and critique[edit]
Some critiques have been given on some of the clinical research that has been done
on REBT both from within and by others. For instance originator Albert Ellis has on
occasions emphasized the difficulty and complexity of measuring psychotherapeutic
effectiveness, since many studies only tend to measure whether clients merely feel
better after therapy instead of them getting better and staying better.[15] Ellis has
also criticized studies for having limited focus primarily to cognitive restructuring
aspects, as opposed to the combination of cognitive, emotive and behavioral
aspects of REBT.[19] As REBT has been subject to criticisms during its existence,
especially in its early years, REBT theorists have a long history of publishing and
addressing those concerns. It has also been argued by Ellis and by other clinicians
that REBT theory on numerous occasions has been misunderstood and
misconstrued both in research and in general.[23]
Some have criticized REBT for being harsh, formulaic and failing to address deep
underlying problems.[24] This has been cogently refuted by REBT theorists who
have pointed out that a careful study of REBT shows that it is both philosophically
deep, humanistic and individualized collaboratively working on the basis of the
clients point of reference.[11][24] They have further pointed out that REBT utilizes
an integrated and interrelated methodology of cognitive, emotive-experiential and
behavioral interventions.[11][19] Others have questioned REBTs view of rationality,
both radical constructivists who have claimed that reason and logic are subjective
properties and those who believe that reason can be objectively determined.[24]
REBT theorists have refuted these claims by maintaining that REBT raises objections
to clients' irrational choices and conclusions as a working hypothesis and through
collaborative efforts demonstrate the irrationality on practical, functional and social
consensual grounds.[16][24] In 1998 when asked what the main criticism on REBT
was, Albert Ellis replied that it was the claim that it was too rational and not dealing
sufficiently enough with emotions. He repudiated the claim by saying that REBT on
the contrary emphasized that thinking, feeling, and behaving are interrelated and
integrated, and that it includes a vast amount of both emotional and behavioral
methods in addition to cognitive ones.[25]
Ellis has himself in very direct terms criticized opposing approaches such as
psychoanalysis, transpersonal psychology and abreactive psychotherapies in
addition to on several occasions questioning some of the doctrines in certain
religious systems, spiritualism and mysticism. Many, including REBT practitioners,
have warned against dogmatizing and sacredizing REBT as a supposedly perfect
psychological cure-all and panacea. Prominent REBTers have promoted the
importance of high quality and programmatic research, including originator Ellis, a
self-proclaimed "passionate skeptic". He has on many occasions been open to

challenges and acknowledged errors and inefficiencies in his approach and

concurrently revised his theories and practices.[16][24] In general, with regard to
cognitive-behavioral psychotherapies' interventions, others have pointed out that as
about 3040% of people are still unresponsive to interventions, that REBT could be
a platform of reinvigorating empirical studies on the effectiveness of the cognitivebehavioral models of psychopathology and human functioning.[23]
REBT has generally been developed, revised and augmented through the years, as
understanding, knowledge and science about psychology and psychotherapy have
progressed. This includes its theoretical concepts, practices and methodology. The
teaching of scientific thinking, reasonableness and un-dogmatism has been inherent
in REBT as an approach, and these ways of thinking have been part of REBT's
empiricism and skepticism.
Applications and interfaces[edit]
Applications and interfaces of REBT are used with a broad range of clinical problems
in traditional psychotherapeutic settings such as individual-, group- and family
therapy. It is used as a general treatment for a vast number of different conditions
and psychological problems normally associated with psychotherapy.
In addition, REBT is used with non-clinical problems and problems of living through
counselling, consultation and coaching settings dealing with problems including
relationships, social skills, career changes, stress management, assertiveness
training, grief, problems with aging, money, weight control etc.
REBT also has many interfaces and applications through self-help resources, phone
and internet counseling, workshops & seminars, workplace and educational
programmes, etc. This includes Rational Emotive Education (REE) where REBT is
applied in education settings, Rational Effectiveness Training in business and worksettings and SMART Recovery (Self Management And Recovery Training) in
supporting those in addiction recovery, in addition to a wide variety of specialized
treatment strategies and applicationsRational emotive behavior therapy, also
known as REBT, is a type of cognitive-behavioral therapy developed by psychologist
Albert Ellis. REBT is focused on helping clients change irrational beliefs.

History of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy

Ellis had trained as a clinical psychologist. As he treated patients, he became

increasingly dissatisfied with the results offered by traditional psychoanalytic
therapy. He noted that while his patients were able to become aware of their
underlying problems, their behavior did not actually change.

By the 1950s, Ellis had started experimenting with other types of psychotherapy
and was heavily influenced by philosophers and psychologists including Karen
Horney and Alfred Adler as well as the work of behavioral therapists. Ellis's goal was
to develop an action-oriented approach to psychotherapy designed to produce
results by helping clients manage their emotions, cognitions, and behaviors.

According to Ellis, "people are not disturbed by things but rather by their view of
things." The fundamental assertion of Rational Emotive Therapy is that the way
people feel is largely influenced by how they think. When people hold irrational
beliefs about themselves or the world, problems result. Because of this, the goal of
REBT is to help people alter illogical beliefs and negative thinking patterns in order
to overcome psychological problems and mental distress.

Rational emotive behavior therapy was one of the very first types of cognitive
therapies. Ellis first began developing REBT during the early 1950s and initially
called his approach rational therapy. In 1959, the technique was redubbed rational
emotive therapy and later rechristened rational emotive behavior therapy in 1992.
Ellis continued to work on REBT until his death in 2007.

The ABC Model

Ellis suggested that people mistakenly blame external events for unhappiness. He
argued, however, that it is our interpretation of these events that truly lies at the
heart of our psychological distress. To explain this process, Ellis developed what he
referred to as the ABC Model:

A Activating Event: Something happens in the environment around you.

B Beliefs: You hold a belief about the event or situation.

C Consequence: You have an emotional response to your belief.

The Basic Steps in Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy

1. Identifying the underlying irrational thought patterns and beliefs.

The very first step in the process is to identify the irrational thoughts, feelings, and
beliefs that lead to psychological distress. In many cases, these irrational beliefs are
reflected as absolutes, as in "I must," "I should," or "I cannot." According to Ellis,
some of the most common irrational beliefs include:

Feeling excessively upset over other people's mistakes or misconduct.

Believing that you must be 100 percent competent and successful in everything to
be valued and worthwhile.

Believing that you will be happier if you avoid life's difficulties or challenges.

Feeling that you have no control over your own happiness; that your contentment
and joy are dependent upon external forces.
By holding such unyielding beliefs, it becomes almost impossible to respond to
situations in a psychologically healthy way. Possessing such rigid expectations of
ourselves and others only leads to disappointment, recrimination, regret, and
anxiety.

2. Challenging the irrational beliefs.

Once these underlying feelings have been identified, the next step is to challenge
these mistaken beliefs. In order to do this, the therapist must dispute these beliefs
using very direct and even confrontational methods. Ellis suggested that rather than
simply being warm and supportive, the therapist needs to be blunt, honest, and
logical in order to push people toward changing their thoughts and behaviors.

3. Gaining Insight and Recognizing Irrational Thought Patterns

As you might imagine, REBT can be a daunting process for the client. Facing
irrational thought patterns can be difficult, especially because accepting these
beliefs as unhealthy is far from easy. Once the client has identified the problematic
beliefs, the process of actually changing these thoughts can be even more difficult.

While it is perfectly normal to feel upset when you make a mistake, the goal of REBT
is to help people respond rationally to such situations. When faced with this type of
situation in the future, the emotionally healthy response would be to realize that
while it would be wonderful to be perfect and never make mistakes, it is not realistic
to expect success in every endeavor. You made a mistake. But that's okay because
everyone makes mistakes. All you can do is learn from the situation and move on.

It is also important to recognize that while rational emotive behavior therapy utilizes
cognitive strategies to help clients, it also focuses on emotions and behaviors as
well. In addition to identifying and disputing irrational beliefs, therapists and clients
also work together to target the emotional responses that accompany problematic
thoughts. Clients are also encouraged to change unwanted behaviors using such
things as meditation, journaling, and guided imagery.

REBT can be effective in the treatment of a range of psychological disorders

including anxiety disorders and phobias as well as specific behaviors such as severe
shyness and excessive approval seeking. Rational emotive behaviour therapy
focuses on uncovering irrational beliefs which may lead to unhealthy negative
emotions and replacing them with more productive rational alternatives.

ARTICLE CONTENTS
Underlying Theory of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
Therapeutic Approach of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
Criticisms of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
Best Fit With Clients
Further Reading on Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
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Underlying Theory of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy

Rational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT) views human beings as responsibly

hedonistic in the sense that they strive to remain alive and to achieve some degree
of happiness. However, it also holds that humans are prone to adopting irrational
beliefs and behaviours which stand in the way of their achieving their goals and
purposes. Often, these irrational attitudes or philosophies take the form of extreme
or dogmatic musts, shoulds, or oughts'; they contrast with rational and flexible
desires, wishes, preferences and wants. The presence of extreme philosophies can
make all the difference between healthy negative emotions (such as sadness or
regret or concern) and unhealthy negative emotions (such as depression or guilt or
anxiety). For example, one persons philosophy after experiencing a loss might take
the form: It is unfortunate that this loss has occurred, although there is no actual
reason why it should not have occurred. It is sad that it has happened, but it is not
awful, and I can continue to function. Anothers might take the form: This
absolutely should not have happened, and it is horrific that it did. These
circumstances are now intolerable, and I cannot continue to function. The first
persons response is apt to lead to sadness, while the second person may be well on
their way to depression. Most importantly of all, REBT maintains that individuals
have it within their power to change their beliefs and philosophies profoundly, and
thereby to change radically their state of psychological health.

REBT employs the ABC framework depicted in the figure below to clarify the
relationship between activating events (A); our beliefs about them (B); and the
cognitive, emotional or behavioural consequences of our beliefs (C). The ABC model
is also used in some renditions of cognitive therapy or cognitive behavioural
therapy, where it is also applied to clarify the role of mental activities or
predispositions in mediating between experiences and emotional responses.

ABC model.
The figure below shows how the framework distinguishes between the effects of
rational beliefs about negative events, which give rise to healthy negative emotions,
and the effects of irrational beliefs about negative events, which lead to unhealthy
negative emotions.

Negative events and healthy vs. unhealthy responses.

In addition to the ABC framework, REBT also employs three primary insights:

While external events are of undoubted influence, psychological disturbance is

largely a matter of personal choice in the sense that individuals consciously or
unconsciously select both rational beliefs and irrational beliefs at (B) when negative
events occur at (A)
Past history and present life conditions strongly affect the person, but they do not,
in and of themselves, disturb the person; rather, it is the individuals responses
which disturb them, and it is again a matter of individual choice whether to maintain
the philosophies at (B) which cause disturbance.
Modifying the philosophies at (B) requires persistence and hard work, but it can be
done.
Therapeutic Approach of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy

The main purpose of REBT is to help clients to replace absolutist philosophies, full of
musts and shoulds, with more flexible ones; part of this includes learning to
accept that all human beings (including themselves) are fallible and learning to
increase their tolerance for frustration while aiming to achieve their goals. Although
emphasizing the same core conditions as person-centred counselling namely,
empathy, unconditional positive regard, and counsellor genuineness in the
counselling relationship, REBT views these conditions as neither necessary nor
sufficient for therapeutic change to occur.

The basic process of change which REBT attempts to foster begins with the client
acknowledging the existence of a problem and identifying any meta-disturbances
about that problem (i.e., problems about the problem, such as feeling guilty about
being depressed). The client then identifies the underlying irrational belief which
caused the original problem and comes to understand both why it is irrational and
why a rational alternative would be preferable. The client challenges their irrational
belief and employs a variety of cognitive, behavioural, emotive and imagery
techniques to strengthen their conviction in a rational alternative. (For example,
rational emotive imagery, or REI, helps clients practice changing unhealthy negative
emotions into healthy ones at (C) while imagining the negative event at (A), as a
way of changing their underlying philosophy at (B); this is designed to help clients
move from an intellectual insight about which of their beliefs are rational and which
irrational to a stronger gut instinct about the same.) They identify impediments to
progress and overcome them, and they work continuously to consolidate their gains
and to prevent relapse.

To further this process, REBT advocates selective eclecticism, which means that
REBT counsellors are encouraged to make use of techniques from other approaches,
while still working specifically within the theoretical framework of REBT. In other
words, REBT maintains theoretical coherence while pragmatically employing
techniques that work.

Throughout, the counsellor may take a very directive role, actively disputing the
clients irrational beliefs, agreeing homework assignments which help the client to
overcome their irrational beliefs, and in general pushing the client to challenge
themselves and to accept the discomfort which may accompany the change
process. What is REBT?

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) is a form of psychotherapy and a

philosophy of living created by Albert Ellis in the 1950's.

REBT (pronounced R.E.B.T. it is not pronounced rebbit) is based on the premise

that whenever we become upset, it is not the events taking place in our lives that
upset us; it is the beliefs that we hold that cause us to become depressed, anxious,
enraged, etc. The idea that our beliefs upset us was first articulated by Epictetus
around 2,000 years ago: "Men are disturbed not by events, but by the views which
they take of them."

The Goal of Happiness

According to Albert Ellis and to REBT, the vast majority of us want to be happy. We
want to be happy whether we are alone or with others; we want to get along with
othersespecially with one or two close friends; we want to be well informed and
educated; we want a good job with good pay; and we want to enjoy our leisure time.

Of course life doesn't always allow us to have what we want; our goal of being
happy is often thwarted by the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." When our
goals are blocked, we can respond in ways that are healthy and helpful, or we can
react in ways that are unhealthy and unhelpful.

The ABC Model

Albert Ellis and REBT posit that our reaction to having our goals blocked (or even
the possibility of having them blocked) is determined by our beliefs. To illustrate
this, Dr. Ellis developed a simple ABC format to teach people how their beliefs cause
their emotional and behavioral responses:

A. Something happens.
B. You have a belief about the situation.
C. You have an emotional reaction to the belief.

For example:

A. Your employer falsely accuses you of taking money from her purse and threatens
to fire you.
B. You believe, She has no right to accuse me. She's a bitch!
C. You feel angry.

If you had held a different belief, your emotional response would have been
different:

A. Your employer falsely accuses you of taking money from her purse and threatens
to fire you.
B. You believe, I must not lose my job. That would be unbearable.
C. You feel anxious.

The ABC model shows that A does not cause C. It is B that causes C. In the first
example, it is not your employer's false accusation and threat that make you angry;
it is your belief that she has no right to accuse you, and that she is a bitch. In the
second example, it is not her accusation and threat that make you anxious; it is the
belief that you must not lose your job, and that losing your job would be
unbearable.

The Three Basic Musts

Although we all express ourselves differently, according to Albert Ellis and REBT, the
beliefs that upset us are all variations of three common irrational beliefs. Each of
the three common irrational beliefs contains a demand, either about ourselves,
other people, or the world in general. These beliefs are known as "The Three Basic
Musts."

I must do well and win the approval of others for my performances or else I am no
good.
Other people must treat me considerately, fairly and kindly, and in exactly the way I
want them to treat me. If they don't, they are no good and they deserve to be
condemned and punished.
I must get what I want, when I want it; and I must not get what I don't want. It's
terrible if I don't get what I want, and I can't stand it.
The first belief often leads to anxiety, depression, shame, and guilt. The second
belief often leads to rage, passive-aggression and acts of violence. The third belief
often leads to self-pity and procrastination. It is the demanding nature of the beliefs
that causes the problem. Less demanding, more flexible beliefs lead to healthy
emotions and helpful behaviors