Monitoring and reviewing an individual’s activity often helps to identify key behaviors. With
a completed activity log, clinicians can use guided discovery to help individuals understand the
relationship between thoughts, mood, and behavior. In some cases it may be important to identify
and encourage prosocial behaviors or prescribe engagement in pleasant or meaningful activities.
For example, depressed individuals often report being withdrawn and engaged in a very narrowed
set of activities. These individuals will likely respond to increased engagement in a greater number
of pleasurable and/or meaningful activities (e.g., behavioral activation) in order to increase opportunities
for positive reinforcement and for evaluation of negative beliefs about the self, others,
and the world.