Black and white thinking, also known as polarized or dichotomous thinking, is a cognitive distortion that involves seeing things in absolutes. It means only focusing on two extreme possibilities, rather than considering the full range of options. Examples of black and white thinking include categorizing people or situations as either good or bad, right or wrong, success or failure, with no middle ground. This type of distorted thinking can contribute to mental health issues like anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. Recognizing examples of black and white thinking is an important first step to challenging this unhelpful cognitive distortion.
Defining black and white thinking
Black and white thinking is a tendency to see things in absolute, polarized terms, with no shades of gray. It involves categorizing people, events, or situations into either end of an extreme. Things are viewed as “all or nothing,” “always or never,” “success or failure,” with no in-between. Black and white thinking distorts reality and creates false dichotomies out of complex situations that have multiple factors at play. For example, seeing outcomes as either total success or complete failure ignores the fact that most outcomes have elements of both success and failure. With black and white thinking, there is no room for complexity, nuance, or subtlety.
Common examples of black and white thinking
Here are some common cognitive distortions that demonstrate black and white thinking:
Labeling – Categorizing yourself or others as either “good” or “bad” based on behavior. For example, “I’m a terrible person because I made a mistake.”
Filtering – Only paying attention to negative information and filtering out positive events. For example, “I failed one test, so I’m stupid.”
Jumping to conclusions – Arbitrarily concluding something negative without evidence. For example, “My partner was quiet today, they must be mad at me.”
Emotional reasoning – Believing that negative emotions accurately reflect reality. For example, “I feel like a failure, so I must be one.”
Overgeneralization – Taking a single negative instance and seeing it as a never-ending pattern. For example, “I can’t do anything right. I always fail.”
Examples of black and white thinking in relationships
Black and white thinking often occurs in relationships. Some examples include:
– Viewing your partner as either perfect or terrible, rather than a complex person with good and bad qualities.
– Labeling small relationship issues as signs the entire relationship is doomed.
– Believing if your needs aren’t always met, then they are never met.
– Thinking that if your partner hurts you, it means they don’t love you at all.
– Assuming a single conflict means the relationship should end.
These examples take limited relationship data and overgeneralize it as absolute truth about the relationship as a whole. In reality, no intimate relationship is perfect. Healthy relationships involve open communication, compromise, and managing a balance of needs.
Examples of black and white thinking in mental health
Black and white thinking is associated with mental health issues like depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and borderline personality disorder. Here are some examples of how it can manifest:
Depression
– Viewing any setback or failure as proof you’re worthless.
– Believing you’ll never feel joy or happiness again based on your current low mood.
– Thinking one negative thought means your mental health progress is ruined.
Anxiety
– Perceiving any uncertainty as catastrophic.
– Thinking you should always feel 100% relaxed, or else something is seriously wrong.
– Assuming that if you don’t get constant reassurance, then your relationship is unstable.
Eating disorders
– Classifying foods as always “good” or “bad” with no nutritional nuance.
– Believing one high calorie meal “ruins” an entire diet.
– Assuming that being anything other than very thin means being “fat.”
Examples of black and white thinking patterns
Here are some rhetorical patterns that demonstrate black and white thinking:
– Using exaggerated, absolute words like “always,” “never,” “every,” “perfect,” “all” “totally,” “completely,” and so on.
– Framing things in narrow terms of success or failure with no room for reasonable outcomes between the extremes.
– Presenting only two options when there are clearly more possibilities.
– Using sensationalist language that paints things as disastrous or amazing even if the reality is more mundane.
– Making vast generalizations from one or a few examples to state absolute truths.
– Presenting opinions as if they are facts without nuance or counterpoints.
The language patterns above reject nuance and inflate certainty. They try to reduce complicated realities down to simplistic either/or binaries.
Examples of how black and white thinking distorts reality
Here are some hypothetical scenarios that demonstrate how black and white thinking warps reality:
– Situation: Lucy applies for a competitive internship but doesn’t get it.
– Black and white thinking: Lucy concludes she must be a complete failure who will never have a successful career.
– Balanced thinking: Lucy is disappointed she didn’t get this internship but recognizes she has many other career opportunities and will eventually land the right role.
– Situation: James argues with his partner.
– Black and white thinking: James believes this single fight means the relationship is completely broken.
– Balanced thinking: All couples argue sometimes; one disagreement doesn’t condemn the entire relationship. Communicating through conflict is normal.
– Situation: Maria’s new business earned a small profit last month.
– Black and white thinking: Maria considers the business a total failure for not immediately earning large profits.
– Balanced thinking: Launching a profitable business takes time. Modest early profits are a success and Maria can build on them.
These examples reveal how black and white thinking takes limited information and blows it out of proportion by catastrophizing or prematurely judging success and failure.
Strategies to overcome black and white thinking
Here are some strategies and techniques to challenge black and white thinking patterns:
– Notice exaggerated absolute language like “always” or “never” and replace it with more realistic qualified language like “sometimes” or “occasionally.”
– Actively look for gray areas and complexities rather than reducing issues to simplistic dichotomies.
– Avoid using loaded words that inflate things as amazing or disastrous without justification.
– Consider whether you’re overlooking any “in-between” possibilities besides the extremes.
– Examine if you’re assuming the worst with little or no evidence.
– Ask yourself if a thought is based on feelings versus facts. Emotions aren’t always accurate.
– Slow down reactions and avoid jumping to dire conclusions. Seek more information.
– Be wary of vast generalizations from limited experiences.
– Consider if a rule you have is unrealistic and unhelpful in its absoluteness.
– See failures or setbacks as learning experiences rather than self-defining disasters.
Conclusion
Black and white thinking is a destructive cognitive distortion that involves categorizing things at meaningless extremes. It eliminates nuance and inflates relatively neutral situations as being constantly amazing or horrible. Learning to recognize and challenge black and white thinking patterns through mindset shifts and balanced thinking is important for mental health. With practice, it’s possible to catch yourself in distorted absolutes and reframe thoughts in a more realistic light.
