Why Anxiety and Depression Undermine Self-Belief, Despite Good Performance: UCL Study Sheds Light
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A study published in Nature Communications by researchers at University College London (UCL) has revealed why individuals with anxiety and depression often struggle with low self-belief—even when their actual performance is on par with others.
The research involved two groups of participants (230 and 278) who played a computer game called "Fruitville," requiring attention and memory skills. After each task, participants rated their confidence and, at the end, assessed their overall performance.
Findings showed that people with stronger symptoms of anxiety and depression tended to build their overall self-belief by focusing on moments where they had low confidence, rather than incorporating times they felt confident. This bias led to a consistently negative view of their own abilities, despite no difference in actual task performance.
Importantly, positive feedback from the game increased self-belief in all participants, and negative feedback reduced it, regardless of mental health status. Yet those with anxiety or depression still maintained lower self-belief due to their skewed focus.
"Our findings offer a simple yet powerful message – that the persistent negative self-beliefs experienced by people with anxiety and depression are often illusory, and may be rooted in a dysfunctional view of how they evaluate themselves," said lead author Dr. Sucharit Katyal, now at the University of Copenhagen.
The study suggests that the way people with anxiety and depression process their own performance may underlie related issues such as imposter syndrome. Researchers hope the insights will inform new strategies to help individuals build and maintain healthier self-perceptions, especially in work and academic settings.
References: Katyal, S., et al. (2025). Distorted learning from local metacognition supports transdiagnostic underconfidence. Nature Communications. doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-57040-0.
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