Negative processing biases predict subsequent depressive symptoms

How children's victimization relates to distorted versus sensitive social cognition: Perception, mood, and need fulfillment in response to Cyberball inclusion and exclusion

This study examined whether victimization is associated with negatively distorted social cognition (bias), or with a specific increased sensitivity to social negative cues, by assessing the perception of social exclusion and the consequences for psychological well-being (moods and fundamental needs). Both self-reported and peer-reported victimization of 564 participants (M_age=9.9years, SD=1.04; 49.1% girls) were measured, and social exclusion was manipulated through inclusion versus exclusion in a virtual ball-tossing game (Cyberball). Children's perceptions and psychological well-being were in general more negative after exclusion than after inclusion. Moreover, self-reported-but not peer-reported-victimization was associated with the perception of being excluded more and receiving the ball less, as well as more negative moods and less fulfillment of fundamental needs, regardless of being excluded or included during the Cyberball game. In contrast, peer-reported victimization was associated with more negative mood and lower need fulfillment in the exclusion condition only. Together, these results suggest that children who themselves indicate being victimized have negatively distorted social cognition, whereas children who are being victimized according to their peers experience increased sensitivity to negative social situations. The results stress the importance of distinguishing between self-reported and peer-reported victimization and have implications for interventions aimed at victimized children's social cognition.

Attentional bias training in girls at risk for depression

BACKGROUND

This study examined, for the first time, whether attentional biases can be modified in adolescents at risk for depression.

METHODS

The final sample consisted of 41 girls at familial risk for depression, who were randomly assigned to receive six sessions (864 trials) of real or sham attention bias training [Real attentional bias training (ABT) vs. Sham ABT]. Participants who received Real ABT completed a modified dot-probe task designed to train attention toward positive and away from negative facial expressions; in contrast, girls who received Sham ABT completed the standard dot-probe task. Attentional biases, self-reported mood, and psychophysiological responses to stress were measured at pre- and post-training assessments.

RESULTS

As expected, girls who received Real ABT, but not those who received Sham ABT, exhibited significant increases from pre- to post-training in their attention toward happy faces and away from sad faces. Moreover, adolescents who received Real ABT were buffered against the negative outcomes experienced by adolescents who received Sham ABT. Specifically, only adolescents who received Sham ABT experienced an increase in negative mood and a pre- to post-training increase in heart rate in anticipation of the stressor.

CONCLUSIONS

The current findings provide the first experimental evidence that attentional biases can be modified in youth at risk for depression and further suggest that ABT modulates the heightened response to stress that is otherwise experienced by high-risk adolescents.

Dyadic Cross-Sectional Associations Between Negative Mood, Marital Idealization, and Relationship Quality

This study aimed to evaluate (a) dyadic associations between relationship quality (RQ) and both depressive and anxious mood (DM and AM), (b) reciprocity hypotheses of negative mood within dyadic interactions, and (c) mediational role of marital idealization between negative mood and relationship quality. Actor-partner interdependence models (APIMs) were performed using data from a sample of 198 dyads. Our results showed that (a) these two facets of negative mood did not have the same weight on RQ and that they had a gender-specific effects pattern, and (b) there was no support for the mood transmission hypothesis. Men's DM displayed direct and indirect (via marital idealization) actor as well as partner effects on RQ, whereas women's DM displayed only a direct actor effect on RQ. There were no significant direct actor effects of AM on RQ, meaning that this link is fully mediated by marital idealization. However, only women's AM showed such indirect effects on RQ.

Mental Imagery-Based Training to Modify Mood and Cognitive Bias in Adolescents: Effects of Valence and Perspective

Mental imagery has a powerful impact on emotion and cognitive processing in adults, and is implicated in emotional disorders. Research suggests the perspective adopted in mental imagery modulates its emotional impact. However, little is known about the impact of mental imagery in adolescence, despite adolescence being the key time for the onset of emotional dysfunction. We administered computerised positive versus mixed valence picture-word mental imagery training to male adolescent participants (N = 60, aged 11–16 years) across separate field and observer perspective sessions. Positive mood increased more following positive than mixed imagery; pleasantness ratings of ambiguous pictures increased following positive versus mixed imagery generated from field but not observer perspective; negative interpretation bias on a novel scrambled sentences task was smaller following positive than mixed imagery particularly when imagery was generated from field perspective. These findings suggest positive mental imagery generation alters mood and cognition in male adolescents, with the latter moderated by imagery perspective. Identifying key components of such training, such as imagery perspective, extends understanding of the relationship between mental imagery, mood, and cognition in adolescence.

The Use of Cognitive and Experiential Techniques to Treat Depression

Treatment of a young woman for symptoms of depression and adjustment problems incorporated cognitive and experiential techniques. Cognitive techniques were used to identify beliefs in incompetence and unlovability of self, and uncontrollability of situations; but logical analysis and challenge of these beliefs proved ineffective. The therapist hypothesized that these core beliefs were not altered by cognitive challenge because they were not fully activated. An obstacle to treatment was the client’s reluctance to fully engage these painful beliefs. Several months into treatment, as depression symptoms increased, a Gestalt two-chair dialogue helped the client make contact with a constellation of beliefs and emotions surrounding vulnerability and competence. Through this work, the client’s belief in her incompetence and unlovability appeared to be dislodged and her belief in the uncontrollability of her situation reduced.

Cognitive Vulnerability to Major Depression: View from the Intrinsic Network and Cross-network Interactions

Although it is generally accepted that cognitive factors contribute to the pathogenesis of major depressive disorder (MDD), there are missing links between behavioral and biological models of depression. Nevertheless, research employing neuroimaging technologies has elucidated some of the neurobiological mechanisms related to cognitive-vulnerability factors, especially from a whole-brain, dynamic perspective. In this review, we integrate well-established cognitive-vulnerability factors for MDD and corresponding neural mechanisms in intrinsic networks using a dual-process framework. We propose that the dynamic alteration and imbalance among the intrinsic networks, both in the resting-state and the rest-task transition stages, contribute to the development of cognitive vulnerability and MDD. Specifically, we propose that abnormally increased resting-state default mode network (DMN) activity and connectivity (mainly in anterior DMN regions) contribute to the development of cognitive vulnerability. Furthermore, when subjects confront negative stimuli in the period of rest-to-task transition, the following three kinds of aberrant network interactions have been identified as facilitators of vulnerability and dysphoric mood, each through a different cognitive mechanism: DMN dominance over the central executive network (CEN), an impaired salience network-mediated switching between the DMN and CEN, and ineffective CEN modulation of the DMN. This focus on interrelated networks and brain-activity changes between rest and task states provides a neural-system perspective for future research on cognitive vulnerability and resilience, and may potentially guide the development of new intervention strategies for MDD.

Mapping the interplay among cognitive biases, emotion regulation, and depressive symptoms

Cognitive biases and emotion regulation (ER) difficulties have been instrumental in understanding hallmark features of depression. However, little is known about the interplay among these important risk factors to depression. This cross-sectional study investigated how multiple cognitive biases modulate the habitual use of ER processes and how ER habits subsequently regulate depressive symptoms. All participants first executed a computerised version of the scrambled sentences test (interpretation bias measure) while their eye movements were registered (attention bias measure) and then completed questionnaires assessing positive reappraisal, brooding, and depressive symptoms. Path and bootstrapping analyses supported both direct effects of cognitive biases on depressive symptoms and indirect effects via the use of brooding and via the use of reappraisal that was in turn related to the use of brooding. These findings help to formulate a better understanding of how cognitive biases and ER habits interact to maintain depressive symptoms.

Attention bias modification via single-session dot-probe training: Failures to replicate

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Across three experiments we investigated transfer effects of single-session attention bias modification via dot-probe training.

METHODS

In experiment 1, participants received training either toward or away from negative images or no-training, and transfer to an affective task-switching task was examined. In two other experiments, participants were trained to orient attention toward either positive or negative words (experiment 2a) or facial expressions (experiment 2b), and transfer to an interpretation bias task was examined.

RESULTS

In all experiments, the dot-probe training procedure did not effectively modify biases in attention allocation at the training condition level, but produced a large variability in individual attention bias acquisition within and across conditions. Individual differences in pre-training attention bias and attention bias acquisition were not related to performance on the affective task-switching task or the interpretation tasks.

LIMITATIONS

The present investigations are limited by the lack of effectiveness of ABM at the condition level, the order in which transfer tasks were administered, and the restricted range of affective symptoms that could moderate training and transfer effects.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings from three experiments provided no evidence for single-session dot-probe ABM procedures to effectively manipulate attention bias toward negative, away from negative, or toward positive stimuli at a training condition level. At the individual differences level of analysis, again no evidence was found for transfer of attention training. The observations invite further empirical scrutiny into factors that moderate attentional plasticity in response to dot-probe ABM procedures to optimize the conditions for effective implementation and transfer of training.

The influence of nonconscious processes on perceptions of downsizing and terminations

Although social and cognitive psychologists have developed a large body of research on priming and other nonconscious processes, relatively little research has focused on how these issues influence organizationally relevant phenomena. The current research sought to partially fill this void by examining the influence of nonconscious processes on perceptions of organizational downsizing. In three studies, individuals were primed with traits of self-reliance or employer-reliance either supraliminally (Study 1) or subliminally (Studies 2 and 3). Studies 1 and 2 found that individuals primed with self-reliance had less negative views of downsizing. Experiment 3 found that those primed with self-reliance reported greater perceptions of fair treatment, respect for their boss, and decreased levels of anger in response to a termination scenario. Implications and future directions are discussed.

Emotionally biased cognitive processes: the weakest link predicts prospective changes in depressive symptom severity

Emotional biases in attention, interpretation, and memory are predictive of future depressive symptoms. It remains unknown, however, how these biased cognitive processes interact to predict depressive symptom levels in the long-term. In the present study, we tested the predictive value of two integrative approaches to model relations between multiple biased cognitive processes, namely the additive (i.e., cognitive processes have a cumulative effect) vs. the weakest link (i.e., the dominant pathogenic process is important) model. We also tested whether these integrative models interacted with perceived stress to predict prospective changes in depressive symptom severity. At Time 1, participants completed measures of depressive symptom severity and emotional biases in attention, interpretation, and memory. At Time 2, one year later, participants were reassessed to determine depressive symptom levels and perceived stress. Results revealed that the weakest link model had incremental validity over the additive model in predicting prospective changes in depressive symptoms, though both models explained a significant proportion of variance in the change in depressive symptoms from Time 1 to Time 2. None of the integrative models interacted with perceived stress to predict changes in depressive symptomatology. These findings suggest that the best cognitive marker of the evolution in depressive symptoms is the cognitive process that is dominantly biased toward negative material, which operates independent from experienced stress. This highlights the importance of considering idiographic cognitive profiles with multiple cognitive processes for understanding and modifying effects of cognitive biases in depression.

Positive Imagery-Based Cognitive Bias Modification as a Web-Based Treatment Tool for Depressed Adults: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Depression is a global health problem requiring treatment innovation. Targeting neglected cognitive aspects may provide a useful route. We tested a cognitive-training paradigm using positive mental imagery (imagery cognitive bias modification, imagery CBM), developed via experimental psychopathology studies, in a randomized controlled trial. Training was delivered via the Internet to 150 individuals with current major depression. Unexpectedly, there was no significant advantage for imagery CBM compared with a closely matched control for depression symptoms as a whole in the full sample. In exploratory analyses, compared with the control, imagery CBM significantly improved anhedonia over the intervention and improved depression symptoms as a whole for those participants with fewer than five episodes of depression and those who engaged to a threshold level of imagery. Results suggest avenues for improving imagery CBM to inform low-intensity treatment tools for depression. Anhedonia may be a useful treatment target for future work.

Activation of the medial prefrontal and posterior cingulate cortex during encoding of negative material predicts symptom worsening in major depression

Considerable research indicates that depressed individuals have better memory for negative material than do nondepressed individuals, and that this bias is associated with differential patterns of neural activation. It is not known, however, whether these aberrant activation patterns predict illness course. Using functional neuroimaging, we examined whether change in depressive symptoms is predicted by baseline patterns of neural activation that underlie negative memory biases in major depressive disorder. Depressed participants viewed negative and neutral pictures during functional MRI at baseline and completed an incidental memory task for these pictures 1 week later. Depression severity was assessed by administering the Beck Depression Inventory both at baseline (Time 1) and at Time 2, an average of 18 months later. Contrast maps of activation for subsequently remembered negative versus subsequently remembered neutral pictures were regressed against change in Beck Depression Inventory scores between Time 1 and Time 2, controlling for initial symptom severity. Results from this analysis revealed no associations between memory sensitivity for negative stimuli and symptom change. In contrast, whole brain analyses revealed significant positive associations between within-subject changes in depressive symptoms and baseline neural activation to successfully recalled negative pictures in the posterior cingulate cortex and medial prefrontal cortex. These findings indicate that neural activation in cortical midline regions is a better predictor of long-term symptomatic outcome than is memory sensitivity for negative material.

Positive interpretation bias predicts well-being in medical interns

Cognitive theories of emotion posit that affective responses may be shaped by how individuals interpret emotion-eliciting situations. This study tested whether individual differences in interpretation bias (i.e., interpreting ambiguous scenarios in a more negative or positive manner) independently predict trait resilience and depression in medical interns. Interpretation bias and trait resilience scores were assessed in 47 interns prior to their first internship. Depressive symptoms were assessed twice during internship. Nearly half of the sample (42%) scored above the cut-off for mild depressive symptoms during internship, a significant rise compared to the initial assessment. Those with a more positive interpretation bias had higher trait resilience (β = 0.44, p = 0.004) and a 6-fold decreased depressive symptom risk during internship (OR = 6.41, p = 0.027). The predictive power of a positive interpretation bias for decreased depression symptoms held over and above initial depressive symptoms, demographics and trait reappraisal. Assessing positive interpretation bias may have practical utility for predicting future well-being in at risk-populations.

Current Neural and Behavioral Dimensional Constructs across Mood Disorders

Our understanding of the underlying neurobiology for mood disorders is still limited. We present an integrated model for conceptualizing and understanding mood disorders drawing upon a broad literature pertinent to mood disorders. The integrated model of emotion processing and regulation incorporates the linguistic constructs of the Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) initiative. In particular, we focus on the Positive Valence domain/circuit (PVC), highlighting recent reward research and the Negative Valence domain/circuit (NVC), highlighting rumination. Furthermore, we also illustrate the Cognitive Control and Problem Solving (CCaPS) circuit, which is heavily involved in emotion regulation, as well as the default mode network (DMN) and interactions between circuits. We conclude by proposing methods for addressing challenges in the developmental study of mood disorders including using high-risk design that incorporates risk for many disorders.

Positive Imagery Cognitive Bias Modification in Treatment-Seeking Patients with Major Depression in Iran: A Pilot Study

Cognitive bias modification paradigms training positive mental imagery and interpretation (imagery CBM-I) hold promise for treatment innovation in depression. However, depression is a global health problem and interventions need to translate across settings and cultures. The current pilot study investigated the impact of 1 week of daily imagery CBM-I in treatment-seeking individuals with major depression in outpatient psychiatry clinics in Iran. Further, it tested the importance of instructions to imagine the positive training materials. Finally, we examined the effects of this training on imagery vividness. Thirty-nine participants were randomly allocated to imagery CBM-I, a non-imagery control program, or a no treatment control group. Imagery CBM-I led to greater improvements in depressive symptoms, interpretive bias, and imagery vividness than either control condition at post-treatment (n = 13 per group), and improvements were maintained at 2-week follow-up (n = 8 per group). This pilot study provides first preliminary evidence that imagery CBM-I could provide positive clinical outcomes in an Iranian psychiatric setting, and further that the imagery component of the training may play a crucial role.

Optimizing the ingredients for imagery-based interpretation bias modification for depressed mood: is self-generation more effective than imagination alone?

Negative interpretation is thought to be crucial in the development and maintenance of depression. Recently developed cognitive bias modification paradigms, intending to change these biases towards a more optimistic interpretation tendency (CBM-I), seem to offer new promising implications for cognitive therapy innovation. This study aimed to increase our knowledge of the underlying mechanisms of action of imagery-based CBM-I in the context of depressed mood. We therefore compared the efficacy of CBM-I requiring participants to imagine standardized positive resolutions to a novel, more active training version that required participants to generate the positive interpretations themselves. Fifty-four participants were randomly allocated to (1) standardized CBM-I, (2) self-generation CBM-I or (3) a control group. Outcome measures included self-report mood measures and a depression-related interpretation bias measure. Both positive training variants significantly increased the tendency to interpret fresh ambiguous material in an optimistic manner. However, only the standardized imagery CBM-I paradigm positively influenced mood.

Self-referent information processing in individuals with bipolar spectrum disorders

BACKGROUND

Bipolar spectrum disorders (BSDs) are common and impairing, which has led to an examination of risk factors for their development and maintenance. Historically, research has examined cognitive vulnerabilities to BSDs derived largely from the unipolar depression literature. Specifically, theorists propose that dysfunctional information processing guided by negative self-schemata may be a risk factor for depression. However, few studies have examined whether BSD individuals also show self-referent processing biases.

METHODS

This study examined self-referent information processing differences between 66 individuals with and 58 individuals without a BSD in a young adult sample (age M=19.65, SD=1.74; 62% female; 47% Caucasian). Repeated measures multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted to examine multivariate effects of BSD diagnosis on 4 self-referent processing variables (self-referent judgments, response latency, behavioral predictions, and recall) in response to depression-related and nondepression-related stimuli.

RESULTS

Bipolar individuals endorsed and recalled more negative and fewer positive self-referent adjectives, as well as made more negative and fewer positive behavioral predictions. Many of these information-processing biases were partially, but not fully, mediated by depressive symptoms.

LIMITATIONS

Our sample was not a clinical or treatment-seeking sample, so we cannot generalize our results to clinical BSD samples. No participants had a bipolar I disorder at baseline.

CONCLUSIONS

This study provides further evidence that individuals with BSDs exhibit a negative self-referent information processing bias. This may mean that those with BSDs have selective attention and recall of negative information about themselves, highlighting the need for attention to cognitive biases in therapy.

Childhood abuse and vulnerability to depression: cognitive scars in otherwise healthy young adults

Models of depression vulnerability posit that negative early experiences, such as exposure to childhood abuse (CA), increase vulnerability to depression later in life. Though most victims of CA do not go on to develop depression, the question remains as to whether these individuals retain cognitive 'scars' that may contribute to depression vulnerability. The present study examined the relationship between self-reported, retrospective CA and cognitive vulnerability to depression in a carefully selected sample of young adults without current or past psychopathology. We measured cognitive vulnerability with both a self-report questionnaire, the Dysfunctional Attitudes Scale (DAS), and a measure of information processing bias, the Scrambled Sentences Test (SST). Self-reported severity of CA was associated with increased cognitive vulnerability to depression on both the DAS and SST. Vulnerability to depression as measured by the SST, but not by the DAS, prospectively predicted increases in depressive symptoms over a 6-month period. Scores on the SST also interacted with CA to predict increases in depressive symptoms. These findings demonstrate the pernicious effects of CA even in those without current or past psychopathology.

Trait pessimism predicts vulnerability to stress-induced anhedonia in rats

Depressive disorder is often associated with cognitive biases. In this study, we took a unique opportunity to investigate whether trait pessimism could predict vulnerability to stress-induced anhedonia in an animal model of depression. In a series of ambiguous-cue interpretation (ACI) tests, we identified animals displaying 'pessimistic' and 'optimistic' traits. Subsequently, the rats were subjected to chronic restraint, and the trait differences in response to stress were investigated using sucrose preference and ACI tests before, during and after the stress regime. Although stress resulted in anhedonia in both subgroups, it occurred faster and lasted longer in the 'pessimistic' compared with the 'optimistic' animals. Chronic stress exposure also increased the negative judgment bias in rats, although this effect was not dependent on the 'pessimistic' trait. For the first time, we demonstrated a link between cognitive judgment bias and vulnerability to stress-induced anhedonia in an animal model. We also introduced a cognitive biomarker, which may be of value for etiological depression studies.

The use of cognitive bias modification and imagery in the understanding and treatment of depression

Cognitive models of depression form the natural link between neurobiological and social accounts of the illness. Interest in the role of cognition in depression has recently been stimulated by the advent of simple, computer-based "cognitive bias modification" (CBM) techniques which are able to experimentally alter cognitive habits in clinical and non-clinical populations. In this chapter, we review recent work which has used CBM techniques to address questions of aetiology and treatment in depression with a particular focus on the interface with neurobiological and social processes relevant to the illness. We find that there are early signs that CBM may be a useful tool in exploring the aetiology of depression, particularly in regard to the neural and genetic factors which influence susceptibility to the illness and response to treatment. There is also early evidence suggesting that CBM has promise in the treatment and prevention of depression. This work suggests that the beneficial effects of CBM are mediated by the interaction between cognitive functioning and environmental and social information. In summary, by providing a method for altering habitual cognitive function in experimental and clinical settings CBM techniques have begun to further the understanding of and the treatment for depression.

Effects of emotion recognition training on mood among individuals with high levels of depressive symptoms: study protocol for a randomised controlled trial

Background

We have developed a new paradigm that targets the recognition of facial expression of emotions. Here we report the protocol of a randomised controlled trial of the effects of emotion recognition training on mood in a sample of individuals with depressive symptoms over a 6-week follow-up period.

Methods/Design

We will recruit 190 adults from the general population who report high levels of depressive symptoms (defined as a score ≥ 14 on the Beck Depression Inventory-II). Participants will attend a screening session and will be randomised to intervention or control procedures, repeated five times over consecutive days (Monday to Friday). A follow-up session will take place at end-of -treatment, 2-weeks and 6-weeks after training. Our primary study outcome will be depressive symptoms, Beck Depression Inventory- II (rated over the past two weeks). Our secondary outcomes are: depressive symptoms, Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression; anxiety symptoms, Beck Anxiety Inventory (rated over the past month); positive affect, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (rated as ‘how you feel right now’); negative affect, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (rated as ‘how you feel right now’); emotion sensitivity, Emotion Recognition Task (test phase); approach motivation and persistence, the Fishing Game; and depressive interpretation bias, Scrambled Sentences Test.

Discussion

This study is of a novel cognitive bias modification technique that targets biases in emotional processing characteristic of depression, and can be delivered automatically via computer, Internet or Smartphone. It therefore has potential to be a valuable cost-effective adjunctive treatment for depression which may be used together with more traditional psychotherapy, cognitive-behavioural therapy and pharmacotherapy.

Trial registration

Current Controlled Trials: ISRCTN17767674

Modulatory effects of the piccolo genotype on emotional memory in health and depression

Major depressive disorder (MDD) has been associated with biased memory formation for mood-congruent information, which may be related to altered monoamine levels. The piccolo (PCLO) gene, involved in monoaminergic neurotransmission, has previously been linked to depression in a genome-wide association study. Here, we investigated the role of the PCLO risk allele on functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) correlates of emotional memory in a sample of 89 MDD patients (64 PCLO risk allele carriers) and 29 healthy controls (18 PCLO risk allele carriers). During negative word encoding, risk allele carriers showed significant lower activity relative to non-risk allele carriers in the insula, and trend-wise in the anterior cingulate cortex and inferior frontal gyrus. Moreover, depressed risk allele carriers showed significant lower activity relative to non-risk allele carriers in the striatum, an effect which was absent in healthy controls. Finally, amygdalar response during processing new positive words vs. known words was blunted in healthy PCLO+ carriers and in MDD patients irrespective of genotype, which may indicate that signalling of salient novel information does not occur to the same extent in PCLO+ carriers and MDD patients. The PCLO risk allele may increase vulnerability for MDD by modulating local brain function with regard to responsiveness to salient stimuli (i.e. insula) and processing novel negative information. Also, depression-specific effects of PCLO on dorsal striatal activation during negative word encoding and the absence of amygdalar salience signalling for novel positive information further suggest a role of PCLO in symptom maintenance in MDD.

Cognitive Aspects of Depression

Depression is a prevalent and impairing psychiatric disorder that affects how we feel and how we think about ourselves and the world around us. Cognitive theories of depression have long posited that various thought processes are involved in the development, maintenance, and recurrence of depressive episodes. Contemporary research has utilized experimental procedures to examine cognitive processes in depressed individuals as well as the nature of the relation of these processes to the emotion dysregulation that is central to the disorder. For example, investigators have assessed the ways in which depression alters aspects of information processing, including attention and perception, interpretation, and memory processes; this research has generated relatively consistent findings. In addition, researchers have attempted to identify and elucidate the cognitive mechanisms that may link these biases in information processing to emotion dysregulation in depression. These mechanisms include inhibitory processes and deficits in working memory, ruminative responses to negative mood states, and the inability to use positive and rewarding stimuli to regulate negative mood. Results of these investigations converge on the formulation that depression is associated with increased elaboration of negative information, difficulties in cognitive control when processing this information, and difficulties disengaging from this information. Research examining cognitive aspects of depression not only enhances our understanding of this common and costly disorder, but also has implications for the treatment of depression and for future investigations of the biological foundations of this disorder.

Cognitive Bias Modification Using Mental Imagery for Depression: Developing a Novel Computerized Intervention to Change Negative Thinking Styles

Why do some people see their glass as half-empty rather than half-full or even imagine that the glass will be filled in the future? Experimental methods can illuminate how individual differences in information processing style can profoundly impact mood or even result in disorders such as depression. A computerized cognitive bias modification intervention targeting interpretation bias in depression via positive mental imagery (CBM-I) was evaluated by investigating its impact on mental health and cognitive bias compared with a control condition. Twenty-six depressed individuals completed either positive imagery-focussed CBM-I or a control condition daily at home over one week. Outcome measures were collected pre-treatment and post-treatment and at two-week follow-up. Individuals in the positive condition demonstrated significant improvements from pre-treatment to post-treatment in depressive symptoms, cognitive bias and intrusive symptoms compared with the control condition. Improvements in depressive symptoms at two-week follow-up were at trend level. The results of this first controlled comparison of positive imagery-focussed CBM-I for depression further support the clinical potential of CBM-I and the development of a novel computerized treatment that could help patients imagine a more positive future. Broader implications concern the modification of individual differences in personality variables via their interaction with key information processing targets. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Personality and Information Processing: We Are What We Encode

This commentary addresses several questions raised by the papers in this special issue: about the nature of information processing methods in the study of personality, the degree to which processing biases are specific to certain types of information, the causal relationship between processing styles and personality, and the extent to which individual variations of information processing are automatic or can be controlled. The implications of the findings described in the papers published in this special issue for each of these questions are discussed, leading to some tentative suggestions for future research into the role of information processing as a contributory cause of personality differences. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Neuropsychologische Aspekte der Depression

Zusammenfassung. Patienten mit Depressionen klagen häufig über Symptome und Störungen nicht nur auf der emotionalen, sondern auch auf der kognitiven Ebene. In dieser Übersichtsarbeit werden schwerpunktmäßig neuropsychologische Befunde zu kognitiven Funktionen bei unipolaren Depressionen zusammengefasst. Die kognitive Theorie der Depression postulierte eine Beeinflussung kognitiver Vorgänge durch emotionale Verzerrungen, die eine wichtige Rolle bei Vulnerabilität, Entstehung, Aufrechterhaltung und Rezidiven depressiver Episoden spielen. Befunde zu dieser Interaktion von kognitiven und emotionalen Prozessen werden dargestellt, außerdem wird auf die Bedeutung dieser Aspekte für die Emotionsregulation und für die Therapie der Depression eingegangen.

Emotion Regulation and the Cognitive-Experimental Approach to Emotional Dysfunction

Since the 1980s, there has been a steady growth of interest in the psychological mechanisms that regulate normal emotional experience. In this same period, cognitive-experimental researchers have sought to delineate the information processing biases that characterize emotional disorders. Exciting potential synergies exist between these two areas of investigation. In this article, we consider ways in which reciprocal benefits could be gained by the constructive transfer of theoretical ideas and methodological approaches between emotion regulation researchers and cognitive-experimental investigators. We also discuss how recent innovations within each field can profitably impact upon progress within the other. It is concluded that the overlap in conceptual constructs, and the convergence of complementary investigative techniques, between these two research domains, provide opportunities for creative synthesis that could significantly enrich understanding of normal and abnormal emotion across future years.

Information processing of food cues in overweight and normal weight adolescents

OBJECTIVES

Based on cognitive theory (CT), the aim of this study is to investigate the cognitive processing of food cues in clinically overweight adolescents.

DESIGN

An experimental design with performance-based measures.

METHODS

Eighty-seven (45 overweight, 42 normal weight) adolescents between the ages of 12 and 18 years were examined. All completed an imbedded word task (IWT), containing high caloric food words and matched control words, as a measure of attention interference. A free-recall task was used to detect explicit memory biases. To study the effects of cognitive avoidance, participants were instructed to suppress thoughts about food or merely to monitor them, prior to completing the IWT and memory task.

RESULTS

No evidence was found for interference in the attention processing of food cues. Also, no effects of thought suppression were found. However, consistent with hypotheses, the overweight adolescents did show an explicit memory bias for food stimuli, not due to a more general negative evaluation of food words.

CONCLUSIONS

The results provide at least partial support for the applicability of CT to adolescent obesity. The study was the first to reveal a memory bias for high caloric food cues in overweight youngsters, which may well reflect a later-stage activation of food-related schemata. These may play a role in food-related preoccupations and overeating. The existence of an early-stage attention bias is less clear and requires further investigation.

The neural substrate of positive bias in spontaneous emotional processing

Even in the presence of negative information, healthy human beings display an optimistic tendency when thinking of past success and future chances, giving a positive bias to everyday's cognition. The tendency to actively select positive thoughts suggests the existence of a mechanism to exclude negative content, raising the issue of its dependence on mechanisms like those of effortful control. Using perfusion imaging, we examined how brain activations differed according to whether participants were left to prefer positive thoughts spontaneously, or followed an explicit instruction to the same effect, finding a widespread dissociation of brain perfusion patterns. Under spontaneous processing of emotional material, recruitment of areas associated with effortful attention, such as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, was reduced relative to instructed avoidance of negative material (F(1,58) = 26.24, p = 0.047, corrected). Under spontaneous avoidance perfusion increments were observed in several areas that were deactivated by the task, including the perigenual medial prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, individual differences in executive capacity were not associated with positive bias. These findings suggest that spontaneous positive cognitive emotion regulation in health may result from processes that, while actively suppressing emotionally salient information, differ from those associated with effortful and directed control.

Explicit memory bias for positively valenced body-related cues in women with binge eating disorder

Overweight women with and without binge eating disorder (BED) are characterized by a marked body dissatisfaction, which may in part be due to the negative comments about their weight. Weight-related teasing and discrimination is reported both by healthy overweight women and women with BED, whereas body dissatisfaction is markedly increased among women with BED. Therefore, a memory bias for negatively valenced body-related cues is suspected to occur as a mediating factor in women with BED. In an experimental study, 18 women with BED were compared to 18 overweight healthy female controls (HC) on a free recall task containing four word categories: positively valenced with and without body-related content and negatively valenced with and without body-related content. While both groups showed a bias towards negatively valenced shape-/weight-related words, women with BED retrieved positively valenced shape-/weight-related words significantly less often compared to overweight HC. Findings suggest that it may be the reduced ability to attend to positively valenced shape-/weight-related information, rather than the activation of negative body schemata that differentiates overweight women with BED from overweight women without BED. Results are discussed in the context of cognitive biases in the maintenance of body dissatisfaction.

Cognition and depression: current status and future directions

Cognitive theories of depression posit that people's thoughts, inferences, attitudes, and interpretations, and the way in which they attend to and recall information, can increase their risk for depression. Three mechanisms have been implicated in the relation between biased cognitive processing and the dysregulation of emotion in depression: inhibitory processes and deficits in working memory, ruminative responses to negative mood states and negative life events, and the inability to use positive and rewarding stimuli to regulate negative mood. In this review, we present a contemporary characterization of depressive cognition and discuss how different cognitive processes are related not only to each other, but also to emotion dysregulation, the hallmark feature of depression. We conclude that depression is characterized by increased elaboration of negative information, by difficulties disengaging from negative material, and by deficits in cognitive control when processing negative information. We discuss treatment implications of these conclusions and argue that the study of cognitive aspects of depression must be broadened by investigating neural and genetic factors that are related to cognitive dysfunction in this disorder. Such integrative investigations should help us gain a more comprehensive understanding of how cognitive and biological factors interact to affect the onset, maintenance, and course of depression.

Inhibition dysfunction in depression: event-related potentials during negative affective priming

The study aimed to investigate whether depressed patients show impairment of valence-dependent inhibition and its neurophysiological correlates. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were collected from 18 patients with unipolar depression and 18 normal controls during an affective negative priming task. A less effective inhibition in patients was specific for negative information. These behavioral effects were paralleled by ERP differences. In addition to the overall reduced P2 amplitude for negative trials and the overall reduced late positive component (LPC) amplitude for positive and negative trials in patients, ERP differences in different conditions for each group were also found. The patients showed reduced central-parietal P2 amplitude and shorter LPC latency in response to negative experimental targets, whereas the controls showed larger left central P2 amplitude and delayed LPC latency in response to negative experimental targets. No such effects were found for positive targets. These results suggest that the inhibition dysfunction of negative affect influences the earlier attention allocation stage and the later evaluation stage in depressed patients.