Implicit Learning, Tacit Knowledge, and Implications for Stasis and Change in Cognitive Psychotherapy

With the evolution of cognitive psychotherapy, there has been an increasing focus on the nature and influence of cognitive structures or schemata. These structures are out of conscious awareness and therefore can be thought of as tacit in nature. As yet, however, there has been little written regarding the implications of the investigations in cognitive psychology of implicit learning and tacit memory for cognitive psychotherapy. This article describes the work of Arthur Reber and other cognitive psychologists on implicit learning and tacit memory and draws tentative implications for the practice of cognitive psychotherapy. Implicit learning processes have been described as robust in nature, holding evolutionary primacy over explicit learning processes, as dissociated from explicit learning, as involving different processes of learning, and as occurring through the tacit detection of covariation. Tacit knowledge precedes and is less available than explicit knowledge.