Behavioral Activation

Behavioral Activation (BA) is a specific CBT skill. It can be a treatment all by itself or can be used alongside other CBT skills such as cognitive restructuring. Behavioral activation helps us understand how behaviors influence emotions, just like cognitive work helps us understand the connection between thoughts and emotions.

Being aware of our mood, emotions, and behaviors is an important part of CBT. In order to know what to do to fix a problem, we first need to understand what is going on! 

Assessment and Activity Monitoring are the first steps of Behavioral Activation. It is important to know exactly what we are doing throughout the day, and how this corresponds to our mood. 

While we can’t fix the depression just by noticing this, we can take a step toward feeling better by understanding which behaviors help us feel better, which continue to maintain the depression as it is, and which make us feel worse.

Use the Assessment and Activity Monitoring Chart on this page to start tracking your activities and mood.