The clinical implications of Samoilov and Goldfried's perspective on emotion in cognitive-behavior therapy

Samoilov and Goldfried (this issue) argue that there should be a change in the way the expression of emotion is regarded in cognitive-behavior therapy . Their proposal, following Robert Zajonc (1980). that emotions are not alw ays linked to cognitions, rests on a restrictive definition of cognition. O ne of the clinical implications of their thesis, that emotions should be el icited in CBT, rather than avoided, is seen to have merit. But they appear to stop short of offering clinical change methods, or explicating change me chanisms, that operate at a noncognitive emotional level.