What Is Your Catastrophizing Index?

Emotions such as anxiety, anger, depression, and guilt are often rooted in cognitive distortions, chief among which is catastrophizing. The latter cognitive distortion is always about something that has happened or been done, or might happen or be done, which involves an exaggerated negative rating of it.

The Psycholinguistics of Catastrophizing

From a psycholinguistic perspective, catastrophizing is an illocutionary (linguistic) act performed in thinking or uttering certain words, under certain conditions, with the intention of negatively rating or judging something. For example, in thinking or saying, “My life is over now that my partner left me,” you catastrophize about your partner having left you.

The catastrophizing act is or tends to be emotionally impactful. That is, negative feelings can be generated or intensified through its performance. For example, “My life is over now that my partner left me” produces or intensifies interoceptive (bodily) negative feelings about your partner having left you. The act can therefore be part of the dynamic process of emotion. For example, it can be part of what is involved in being depressed.

Usually, the performance of catastrophizing occurs within a chain of deductive inferences. For example, “Since my partner left me, my life is over; therefore, I can’t stand to go on living.” Hence the act can spawn further self-destructive linguistic acts (disavowing one’s capacity to continue existing), potentially culminating with the decision to end one’s life. Catastrophizing can therefore have serious behavioral consequences.

In the case of depression, the target of the illocutionary act of catastrophizing is something that has happened or is in the process of happening, as in the above example—the breakup of a relationship. In the case of anxiety, it is a possible future event, for example, the possibility of losing one’s job. In the case of anger, the target is an action of another, for example, a nasty remark or a betrayal of trust. In the case of guilt, it is one’s own perceived moral transgression, for example, having lied to a friend.

The Relativity of Catastrophizing

While the term “catastrophizing” may suggest otherwise, catastrophic judging is relative rather than “all or nothing.” Thus, you may catastrophize more or less about the prospect of losing your job. The intensity of the feelings generated will, in turn, be positively correlated with the degree to which you negatively judge such a loss. For instance, you may perceive your breakup as “the worst thing that could ever have happened to you,” which tracks an extremely intense, depressed feeling. On the other hand, you may perceive failing your exam as a terrible thing, yet not the worst thing that could have happened to you, which, in turn, tracks a less intense feeling.

While language such as “awful,” “horrible,” and “terrible” can be used as linguistic performatives of catastrophizing, they are quantitatively vague; that is, they tend to be ill-suited to precisely indicate the degree to which you may be catastrophizing. This can have consequences for the assessment of your progress in working through a tendency to catastrophize about things. Hence, there is needed a better understanding of how to measure the degree to which you are catastrophizing.

Measuring Catastrophizing

One way in which I have quantitatively assessed a client’s catastrophizing is to ask the client to perform the following set of rational-emotive imagery activities:

1. Imagine a “negative values” scale ranging from 0 to 10, where 10 is “the worst thing that could possibly happen.”
2. Imagine the bad event in question and feel the intensity of the feeling you experience in catastrophizing about it.
3. While introspectively keying into your negative feeling, rank how bad the event in question feels on the 10-point negative value scale. (E.g., “Failing this exam makes me feel like such a loser. I give it a 10 on the bad scale!”).
4. Shift focus to rationally assessing how bad the event in question is. (“I know I could always try to do better on the next exam, and, in any event, there are so many worse things than this. I give it a 2 on the bad scale.”)

Based on the data gathered from steps (3) and (4), the client can check their catastrophizing index, for example, measure precisely how much they have catastrophized the result of failing the exam, namely 8 points on the 10-point negative rating scale (10 - 2 = 8). In this manner, as you work to overcome your tendency to catastrophize about something, you can periodically check your progress. “Last time, my catastrophizing index was 8; now I am at a 4.”

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Steps (3) and (4) can also highlight the cognitive dissonance between what you emotionally experience versus what you intellectually appreciate. Importantly, be careful not to confuse these steps. Thus, I have found that some clients try to rationally assess the badness of something without first attempting to get themselves to feel the way they feel in catastrophizing about it. For example, you may rationally assess that something is only a 2 instead of putting yourself in the state of mind wherein it feels like a 9 or 10. As such, this gives a false measure of how you really feel when, in going about your life, you find yourself catastrophizing about something.

Conclusion

Many emotional disturbances involve catastrophizing. However, the usual modus operandi is to look for catastrophic language such as terms like “terrible,” “horrible,” and “awful” to identify catastrophic thinking. However, these terms or related ones are quantitatively vague, and may not even be used in the act of catastrophizing. In contrast, the methodology suggested here can allow you to quantitatively self-assess your degree of catastrophizing, which can then allow you to track your progress in overcoming this self-destructive cognitive distortion.

In the case of therapists who take a cognitive approach, it can provide a way to measure if their interventions to reduce catastrophizing in their clients is working, or if they need to change or refine their interventions. Indeed, because this methodology is relatively quick and easy to implement, it can seamlessly be integrated into therapy sessions and provide useful feedback.