SELECTIVE PROCESSING OF CONCERN-RELATED INFORMATION IN DEPRESSION

Objectives. The major question examined in this paper is whether selec tive attentional and interpretative processing of emotional informatio n occurs in depression, and if so, whether it depends on a close match between the material used and current concerns. Design. Twenty-four d epressed patients and the same number of matched controls were tested using two selective processing tasks (described below), and their perf ormance related to self-reported sociotropic and autonomy-related conc erns. Methods. Colour-naming interference and interpretation of ambigu ous situations were assessed using material judged relevant to each of the Sociotropy-autonomy Scales. Results. Depression was associated wi th a general interference effect for all negative concern words, and m ore negative interpretations of ambiguous situations, while controls s howed a converse bias in favour of all positive interpretations. There was no convincing evidence that this negative processing bias was pro portional to the match between material and self-reported sociotropic or autonomous concerns. Conclusions. Depressed patients showed evidenc e of cognitive biases favouring all negative self-related information, on both attentional and interpretative tasks. We suggest that such ef fects in depression may occur only under conditions allowing the elabo rative processing of negative material related to oneself.