Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is an empirically supported treatment for various mental health disorders including depression. Over the past 50 years cognitive behavioral therapy has been one of the most widely used approaches in the treatment of depression and anxiety. There are different types of cognitive behavioral therapy, but all focus on the client's thoughts as a key component to maladaptive emotions and behaviors.
Major Depressive Disorder
Depression is a psychological disorder that involves the client experiencing depressed mood, little or no interest in engaging in pleasurable activities, excessive guilt, sleep and/or appetite disturbance, thoughts about death and decreased energy and concentration. One of the first techniques used in CBT involves having clients engage in pleasurable activities. A cognitive behavioral therapist may have the client list activities he once found enjoyable, and document how often he experiences pleasure and mastery in a given week. By documenting all activities engaged in during a one-week period, the therapist can see if the client is high or low in pleasure and mastery, and work with the client to increase both daily. Psychologists practicing CBT use a technique called behavioral activation to increase the client's pleasure and mastery activities over time, a key component to improving mood in the short term.
Motivation and Depression
Very often depressed clients have decreased motivation to engage in activities. A cognitive behavioral therapist works with clients to identify barriers to engaging in activities and help overcome these obstacles. Behavioral activation techniques involve having clients identify activities they once found enjoyable, playing sports, socializing with friends, taking photographs, watching a movie. It's also important that the client feel effective in the activity (“mastery”).
Social support is often a factor in increasing behavioral activation. It's important to distinguish between using friends/social support as a mechanism for complaining (ruminating about negative thoughts out loud to another person) versus true social support, where reliance on another person actually helps mood rather than making it worse through commiserating.
Exercise and Depression
Exercise has been found to increase people's moods. Behavioral activation techniques may also involve encouraging a client to engage in increased physical activity, which also helps sleep and appetite disturbances often experienced by depressed people. A therapist might encourage clients to begin physical activity lately, such as walking around the block and gradually increasing to longer times or distances. Combining exercise with social support is a great way to lift someone's mood, such as going for a walk with a friend.
For an updated, more in-depth look at this topic, see Soccer & Weight Lifting Treat Depression.