Albert Ellis developed Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) in 1955. REBT is a short-term cognitive-behavioral therapy that helps clients identify irrational and self-defeating thoughts that lead to negative emotions and behaviors. It uses the A-B-C model to show how an activating event (A) interacts with a person's beliefs (B) to cause emotional and behavioral consequences (C). The therapist challenges clients' irrational beliefs (B) and teaches more rational thinking to disrupt the link between beliefs and negative consequences. REBT aims to help clients adopt beliefs like "I did my best" instead of "I'm a failure" to feel less distress and behave more productively.

1. RATIONAL EMOTIVE
BEHAVIOUR
THERAPY (REBT)-
ALBERT ELLIS
Aysha Muhammed Saleem
MSc Psychology (3rd Sem)
ILM College of arts & Science

2. Introduction: Who is Albert
Ellis?
2

3. ❏ Albert Ellis (September 27, 1913 – July 24, 2007) was
an American psychologist who in 1955 developed
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT).
❏ He held MA and PhD degrees in clinical psychology
from Columbia University and the American Board of
Professional Psychology (ABPP).
❏ He also founded and was the President of the New York
City-based Albert Ellis Institute for decades.
❏ He is generally considered to be one of the originators of
the cognitive revolutionary paradigm shift in
psychotherapy and an early proponent of cognitive-
behavioral therapies
3

4. REB
T
4
● Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) is a
short-term form of psychotherapy that helps you
identify
self-defeating thoughts and feelings, challenge
the rationality of those feelings, and replace
them with healthier, more productive beliefs.
● REBT focuses mostly on the present time to help
you understand how unhealthy thoughts and beliefs
create emotional distress which, in turn, leads to
unhealthy actions and behaviors that interfere with
your current life goals.
● Once identified and understood, negative thoughts
and actions can be changed and replaced with
more positive and productive behavior, allowing
you to develop more successful personal and
professional relationships.

5. Basics of
REBT
5
● The fundamental principles of REBT are best understood by
an appreciation of the ABC model. This model assumes that
as individuals we disturb ourselves about experiences by the
beliefs we hold.
● REBT is a self-help / self-management type of therapy.
● REBT is popular because it makes sense to most people,
and they can and do use it.
● REBT is also the only cognitive-behavioral therapy that
encourages people to examine their philosophy of life – their
goals, values, etc.

6. REBT: The
Basic
6
R = Rational Most people realize that when they think more rationally and
reasonably, their life goes better. So this piece makes sense to them.
E= Emotive Most people understand that their emotions are affected by
what happens to them and how they think about those events.
B = Behaviour Most people accept that what they do (their behavior) affects
how they think and feel.
T = Therapy but it can also mean Teaching or Training.

7. According to Ellis, these are other common irrational
assumptions:
• The idea that one should be thoroughly competent at
everything.
•The idea that is it catastrophic when things are not
the way you want them to be.
• The idea that people have no control over their happiness.
•The idea that you need someone stronger than
yourself to be dependent on.
• The idea that your past history greatly influences your present
life.
•The idea that there is a perfect solution to human problems,
and it’s a disaster if you don’t find it.
7

8. REBT can be particularly helpful for people living
with a variety of issues, including:
● depression
● anxiety
● addictive behaviors
● phobias
● overwhelming feelings of anger, guilt, or rage
● procrastination
● disordered eating habits
● aggression
● sleep problems etc..
8

9. A-B-C MODEL
A:
ACTIVATI
NG
EVENT
9
C:
CONSEQUEN
CES
B:
BELIE
FS

10. CONTINUE.
.
A - Activating Event or objective situation
The first column records the objective situation, that is, an event that
ultimately leads to some type of high emotional response or negative
dysfunctional thinking.
B - Beliefs
In the second column, the client writes down the negative thoughts that
occurred to them.
C - Consequence
The third column is for the negative feelings and dysfunctional behaviors that
ensued. The negative thoughts of the second column are seen as a connecting
bridge between the situation and the distressing feelings. The third column C is
next explained by describing emotions or negative thoughts that the client thinks
sorrow, anxiety, 11

11. ● Ellis believes that it is not
the activating event (A)
that causes negative
emotional and behavioral
consequences (C), but
rather that a person
interprets these events
unrealistically and therefore
has an irrational belief
system
(B) that helps cause the
consequences (C).
12

12. REBT
Example
IRRATIONAL BELIEF
A: You are told by your boss
that he is unhappy with your
work
B: I’m a failure
C: Anxiety and depression
RATIONAL BELIEF
A: You are told by your
boss that he is unhappy
with your work
B: I did my best
C: Disappointmented but
confident that things will
get better 13

13. continue.
.
13
Here, we can interpret any event (A) according to
rational/irrational beliefs (B).
- If our beliefs(B) are irrational, we will suffer greatly (an
undesirable C)
-But if our beliefs(B) are generally rational, we will suffer
less and rebound faster (a more desirable C)

14. Therapeutic
Relationship
14
● Ellis believes that the best way to develop a therapeutic
relationship is to help solve the client’s immediate problem.
● Ellis identifies the activating events, irrational beliefs, and
emotional and behavioural consequences (ABC).
● Ellis may do this for 2 or 3 sessions and then possibly work on
longer issues.
● The relationship between client and therapist is important in REBT.
● With patient who are unfamiliar with REBT, the therapist often
introduces the purpose of therapy.

15. Role of
Counsellor
● Challenge the clients to validate his/her
ideas
● Use logical analysis to minimize the clients
irrational beliefs
● Show how this ideas can be replaced with
more irrational ideas.
● teach the client how to apply the scientific
approach to thinking so that he/she can
observed and minimize the irrational ideas
and illogical deductions which foster self-
destructive ways of feeling and behaving.
15

16. The methods involved in REBT
include:
16
● Disputing irrational beliefs in a systematic and
logical way.
● Changing one’s language from should and
musts to preferences.
● Using humour to reduce the exaggerated
effects of irrational thoughts and beliefs.
● Doing cognitive homework to identify absolutistic
beliefs behind their problem. This can include
assignments to observe their self-fulfilling
prophecies, reading self-help books and listening
to tapes of earlier counselling sessions to
critique their original self-defeating beliefs.
•I MUST come across well
to others or else I'm
worthless.
•I MUST be socially
competent or else I am no
good.
•I MUST not make mistakes
in social situations or I am a
misfit.

17. This theory tells
us:
1.How we think affects how we feel.
2.How we feel affects how we behave.
3.How we behave affects how we live our
lives 4.Change the thought = Change the
Consequence.
17

18. 18