Introduction
Cognitive theories of depression state that people have characteristic ways of understanding negative life events and that those who exhibit a dispositional negative cognitive style and dysfunctional attitudes are at greater risk for depression (Abramson et al.
1989; Beck
1987). The hopelessness theory of depression (Abramson et al.
1989) postulates that depressive symptoms are likely to occur when negative life events are attributed to stable and global causes, when they are perceived as being associated with other negative consequences in the future, and construed as implying personal deficit and worthlessness. Considerable empirical support shows that the negative cognitive style featured in the hopelessness theory, especially in interaction with stressors, predicts prospective depressive symptoms and clinically significant depressive disorders (Abramson et al.
2002; Hankin et al.
2004,
2005; Scher et al.
2005).
Rumination is another cognitive risk factor for depression that has received growing attention in the literature. According to the response style theory (Nolen-Hoeksema
1991), rumination is defined as a mode of thinking that involves repetitively and passively focusing on one’s symptoms of depression as well as on the causes and consequences of those symptoms. The theory proposes that individuals have dispositional differences in the way they react to negative mood states and those who respond to a depressed mood by consistently engaging in rumination tend to have more persistent and severe depressive episodes. In contrast, responses that serve to distract one from depressed mood are posited to alleviate feelings of sadness. Although the original theory suggested that rumination should predict the duration of depressed mood or depressive episodes, recent evidence suggests that rumination also predicts new onsets of major depressive episodes (Just and Alloy
1997; Nolen-Hoeksema
2000; Nolen-Hoeksema et al.
1994). Experimental studies have shown that rumination (relative to distraction) intensified negative mood states, enhanced negative thinking and memory, and impaired social problem solving in dysphoric individuals (see Lyubomirsky and Tkach
2004 for a review). However, similar effects did not observe among nondysphoric individuals, suggesting that it is the combination of dysphoria and rumination that contributes to the negative outcomes in rumination (Lyubomirsky and Nolen-Hoeksema
1995).
A recent study found that negative cognitive style and rumination represent empirically distinct (albeit highly correlated) cognitive risk factors for depression (Hankin et al.
2007). In an attempt to conceptualize the relationship between negative cognitive style and rumination in depression, Abramson et al. (
2002) proposed that cognitively vulnerable individuals should be at higher risk for engaging in rumination as their underlying negative thinking makes it very difficult to exit the self-regulatory cycle. Empirical data support that individuals who exhibit a negative cognitive style and have the tendency to ruminate would be more likely than others to have more severe depressive episodes (Alloy et al.
2000; Robinson and Alloy
2003). Besides, rumination has been found to mediate the relationship between depression and negative cognitive style, as well as dysfunctional attitudes and neuroticism, suggesting that rumination may represent a common mechanism through which a variety of risk factors affect depression (Lo et al.
2008; Roberts et al.
1998; Spasojevic and Alloy
2001). Along with the negative cognitive consequences of rumination that have been found in the experimental studies, rumination and negative cognitive style may be dynamically related and their relationship may be reciprocal in nature. The presence of rumination would increase the influence of negative cognition on depression and this, in turn, would increase the influence of depression on cognition in a way that a self-perpetuated cycle of cognitive–affective processing would be generated during depression (Ciesla and Roberts
2007; Teasdale
1999).
Recent evidence has suggested that the consequences of rumination could be moderated by the mode of thinking adopted in times of distress. Two distinct modes of self-focus during rumination have been identified that have distinct functional properties with respect to depression (Watkins and Moulds
2005; Watkins and Teasdale
2004). The abstract analytical processing mode is focused on evaluating higher level causes, meanings, consequences, and implications of self-experience. In contrast, the concrete experiential processing mode is focused on the lower level, specific, and direct experience of one’s thoughts, feelings, and sensations in the present moment. The theoretical rationale for this distinction comes from the reduced concreteness theory (Borkovec et al.
1998; Stober and Borkovec
2002) and the interacting cognitive subsystems theory (Teasdale
1999). Both these theories propose that abstract analytical processing at times of negative self-experience is maladaptive in depression since it is associated with poorer emotional processing and overgeneralization (Ganellen
1988; Teasdale
1999). The abstract analytical processing may also provide event descriptions that are less detailed and conceptual that might hinder effective problem solving.
Research findings showed that among depressed patients, an induction of analytical self-focus (the abstract analytical mode) reduced the specificity of autobiographical memory recall (Watkins and Teasdale
2001,
2004), impaired social problem solving (Watkins and Moulds
2005), and increased endorsement of global negative self-judgments (Rimes and Watkins
2005) compared to experiential self-focus (the concrete experiential mode). Consistently, such differential effect was not evident among nondepressed participants, suggesting that the presence of depressive symptoms would be necessary to trigger the negative effect of rumination. These findings provide support to the mode of processing hypothesis (Watkins and Moulds
2005) that it is the processing mode, and not the degree of self-focus, that influences cognitive consequences in depression. However, since these studies did not include a distraction condition, it would be difficult to draw conclusions regarding the different predictions of processing mode hypothesis and the degree of self-focus hypothesis. Given that abstract analytical processing would facilitate overgeneralization, it is speculated that reliance on an abstract analytical processing mode during rumination would also amplify and intensify the underlying negative cognitive style (as featured in the hopelessness theory of depression) in individuals who are experiencing depressive symptoms.
In summary, research evidence suggests the presence of depressive symptoms and the analytical mode of processing during rumination would activate negative cognitive style. However, little research has directly investigated how these variables may act together to enhance the effect of negative cognitive style. It is important to examine the potential moderating effect directly so as to shed light on the dynamic relationship among these factors. It is also imperative to examine how these vulnerability factors interrelate in order to more fully understand the mechanisms leading to depression, and thus identify the most appropriate points for intervention and guide the development of even more efficacious treatments of depression.
The present experimental study investigated the moderating effect of depressive symptoms and the processing mode in rumination on activating negative attributional style (the negative inferences about the causes of negative events). In accordance with the processing mode hypothesis (Watkins and Moulds
2005), mode of processing during rumination, and not the degree of self-focus would be associated with the level of negative attributional style. In addition to manipulating the mode of processing, a distraction condition was included as a reference condition so that the differential effects of processing mode and degree of self-focus could be directly examined. It was hypothesized that the level of depressive symptoms would interact with the mode of processing in predicting negative attributional style. Specifically, it was predicted that a stronger association between depressive symptoms and negative attributional style would be found in the analytical self-focus condition (a maladaptive mode of processing) than would be found in the experiential self-focus and distraction conditions.
Discussion
This study examined the relationship between rumination and negative attributional style with the hypothesis that the effect of rumination on negative attributional style would depend on both the level of depressive symptoms and mode of processing during rumination. The present findings provide support for this prediction and suggest that the processing mode in rumination interacts with depressive symptoms to predict negative attributional style.
Specifically, the results revealed a stronger association between depressive symptoms and negative attributional style in the analytical self-focus condition, relative to the experiential self-focus and the distraction conditions. These findings indicate that ruminating in an abstract analytical mode activates and intensifies the underlying negative attributional style in people who are experiencing higher levels of depressive symptoms. Given that a weaker association between depressive symptoms and negative attributional style was found in the experiential self-focus and distraction conditions, the processing mode hypothesis was directly supported that it is the mode of processing during self-focus, and not the degree of self-focus that determines the negative cognitive outcomes in depression (Watkins and Moulds
2005).
Previous studies suggest that both rumination and negative cognitive style predict depressive symptoms (Alloy et al.
2000; Ciesla and Roberts
2007; Robinson and Alloy
2003) and similar patterns of findings were also obtained in this sample.
1 The results of the present study, along with the previous research, demonstrate that the presence of depressive symptoms (which may have been initially caused by a negative cognitive style), may further increase the accessibility of negative attributional style through the negative effects of ruminative processing (Ciesla and Roberts
2007; Teasdale
1999). Past research suggests that cognitively vulnerable individuals are at higher risk for engaging in rumination and the present results extend the finding that ruminating in an abstract analytical mode further facilitates the access to negative attributional style. It is important to note that such findings did not suggest rumination creates or causes the negative attributional style, but did suggest that it makes the effect more available to those with elevated levels of depressive symptoms. Given that the negative effect of abstract analytical processing has been found in social problem solving, overgeneral memory, and global negative self-judgments, and that it further extends to the negative attributional style that characterizes depressed people, rumination in the mode of abstract analytical processing might be a critical proximal mechanism that contributes to depression by creating a vicious cycle of cognitive–affective processing in times of dysphoria (Teasdale
1999). The findings also provide further evidence for the proposed reciprocal and dynamic relationship among rumination, negative cognitive style, and depressive symptoms. Nevertheless, owing to the preliminary nature of the findings, future longitudinal research is needed to further elucidate the direction and nature of the causal relationships among these variables.
Although negative cognitive style is considered to be a static, trait-like feature in depression-prone individuals, the present findings showed that the effect of negative attributional style on depression might depend upon the dynamic activation of an abstract-analytical mode of self-focus in times of distress (Watkins and Teasdale
2004). Furthermore, previous research has demonstrated that the effect of negative attributional style (generality score of the ASQ) could be responsive to a mood priming challenge among dysphoric students with a history of depression (Fresco et al.
2006). Although the vulnerability-stress model posits that the effect of negative cognitive style on depression can be triggered by negative life events, these findings suggest that the underlying cognitive vulnerability could also be activated by internal affective and cognitive processes such as negative mood states and ruminative processing (Scher et al.
2005).
From the clinical perspective, the current findings suggest that both negative attributional style and the abstract analytical mode of ruminative processing are important cognitive factors related to depression. Although standard cognitive behavioral therapy for depression primarily targets changing dysfunctional thought contents, which is necessary and important, one potential way to improve the treatment efficacy might be to modify maladaptive ruminative processing as well. It may be important to help depressed people disengage from the analytical mode of processing that is habitually activated in times of distress. Although distraction could be effective to alleviate transient sad mood states, the effect of experiential self-focus implies that teaching depressed people to adopt a nonanalytical form of self-focus might both facilitate emotional processing and improve problem solving in a manner that would contribute to the treatment process (Ma and Teasdale
2004).
Finally, although we have demonstrated the differential effect between rumination and distraction on dysphoric affect, we were unable to replicate the findings from adult samples that these effects on mood are dependent on the pre-existing level of depressive symptoms. It may be possible that younger participants may be more labile and changeable in mood and that their affective responses to rumination manipulation would be different. Similar findings have been reported in an adolescent sample that both the depressed and control groups of participants showed similar increase in negative mood after a rumination induction (Park et al.
2004).
There are some limitations that need to be addressed. First, the sample size was relatively small, and the fact that the participants exhibited only a mild to a moderate level of depression limits the extent to which the findings can be generalized to a clinical population. Second, we did not have a manipulation check associated with the experimental tasks and thus we can only infer the behavior of participants during the manipulation process. Last, future studies should consider using more sophisticated methodologies when assessing the effects of rumination in laboratory to diminish the potential influence of demand and response bias effects.