CBT/ERP, medicalised Skinner pavlovian model, cheap, short term relief of symptoms, no long lasting effect.
CBT = there is no unconscious!
CBT is based on a theory that it is not events in themselves that upset us, but the meanings we give them. However, CBT believes that this meaning is conscious, can be accessed, and is not ambiguous.
If someone says that they feel sorry for a person, they do feel sorry and it is possible that their problem is that they should not; the therapist then tries to help the patient to see that they are thinking about something in the ‘wrong way’. By using brain washing techniques.
The concept of the unconscious, a central Freudian discovery, renders the picture instantly more complex: if you say you are sorry for someone it might indeed mean that you are sorry, but could also mean that you can’t face your own aggressiveness and the fact that you are delighted at what happened to the other.
The question of the existence of the unconscious is crucial, because if CBT starts to take into account the possibility of unconscious meanings and logic, then it would become another branch of psychoanalysis.