Previously depressed patients continue to focus on negative

People who have recovered from a major depressive episode, when compared with individuals who have never experienced one, tend to spend more time processing negative information and less time processing positive information, putting them at risk for a relapse, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.

For this paper, researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 44 studies involving 2081 participants with a history of major depressive disorder and 2285 healthy controls. All studies examined participants’ response times to negative, positive or neutral stimuli.

Healthy participants as a group responded more quickly to emotional and non-emotional stimuli than participants with a history of depression, regardless of whether those stimuli were positive, neutral or negative. But participants who previously had major depressive disorder spent more time processing negative emotional stimuli over positive stimuli compared with controls. While healthy controls showed a significant difference in how much time they spent processing positive vs. negative emotional stimuli compared with those in remission from major depression, that distinction did not appear when comparing time spent processing negative vs. neutral or positive vs. neutral stimuli.

Overall, the findings suggest that individuals with recurrent major depressive disorder not only are less able to control the information they process than healthy individuals, they also display a greater bias for focusing on negative over positive or neutral information, according to researchers.

Reference: “Biased Cognitive Control of Emotional Information in Remitted Depression: A Meta-Analytic Review,” by Alainna Wen, PhD, University of California, Los Angeles; Ethan Fischer, BSc, and Lira Yoon, PhD, University of Maryland Baltimore County; and David Watson, PhD, University of Notre Dame. Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science, https://doi.org/10.1037/abn0000848