Often times, thoughts that are largely accurate or even innocuous at the surface level can lead to intense sadness, anxiety or anger. For example, telling myself that “this meat tastes bad” or “I fumbled that word” or “she is not paying attention” can quickly result in a drastic mood change.
In CBT, the downward arrow technique is a way of working through these automatic thoughts to find the irrational beliefs at their base that are triggering the strong emotions. These beliefs may not be immediately obvious to us, so we need to ask the same questions repeatedly until we get to the bottom of it: “what does that mean about me?” and “why is it upsetting to me?”.
When we get to the end of the chain, we will find a deep-seated – and mostly unhelpful – belief that explains where these intense feelings are coming from. That is called a “core belief” or “schema” and commonly builds on themes of incompetence or failure, abandonment or unlovability, and helplessness. Once these schemas are identified, we can challenge them using CBT techniques similar to the ones applied to automatic negative thoughts.
Examples of Downward Arrow technique:
1) This meat tastes bad
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I am a terrible cook
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I am a bad mother
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I am a complete failure
2) I fumbled that word
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I didn’t do everything perfectly
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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People will be disappointed in me
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I will be alone forever
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I am unlovable
3) She is not paying attention
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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She doesn’t care about me
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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Nothing I do can make things better
And if that were true, what would that mean about you? Why is it upsetting to you?
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I am helpless
With good CBT techniques, you can identify your schemas and change them over time.