Reduced autobiographical memory specificity is considered to be a vulnerability
factor for depression and is a significant predictor of the course of depression.
Previous studies have shown that different natures of rumination (abstract versus
concrete) have different effects on autobiographical memory specificity. Knowing
more about the relationship among depression, rumination, and autobiographical
memory specificity is important for understanding the cognitive biases in depression.
This study explored whether rumination of different valences had different effects on
autobiographical memory specificity in participants with major depressive disorder.
A 2 (group: MDD, control) x 2 (rumination: positive, negative) x 2 (time: pre, post)
mixed design was used. Fifty-two currently depressed people and 52 nonpsychiatric
controls completed this experiment. They did the Autobiographical Memory Test
and the mood ratings before and after either the positive or the negative rumination
task. In the rumination task, they were requested to focus their attention on some
specific thoughts about themselves. Results showed a significant group (depressed,
control) x time (pre, post) interaction effect for the number of specific memories.
This was a result of a significant decrease in specific memories retrieved after
negative rumination in the depressed group, but not after positive rumination. No
significant result was found among the nonpsychiatric controls. These findings seem
to be related to the inhibitory deficit of depressed people in keeping task-irrelevant
negative materials from the working memory. Therefore, the working memory
capacity is lowered and fewer specific memories are retrieved. / published_or_final_version / Clinical Psychology / Doctoral / Doctor of Psychology
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:HKU/oai:hub.hku.hk:10722/179882 |
| Date | January 2010 |
| Creators | Cheung, Sim-ling., 張嬋玲. |
| Publisher | The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) |
| Source Sets | Hong Kong University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | PG_Thesis |
| Source | http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B47656980 |
| Rights | The author retains all proprietary rights, (such as patent rights) and the right to use in future works., Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License |
| Relation | HKU Theses Online (HKUTO) |
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