Nicole Geschwind

Background: Aggression is a key factor in various mental health problems including personality disorders, underscoring the importance of effective interventions for regulating or preventing aggression. Positive psychology suggests that promoting prosocial emotions such as joy and compassion may help to buffer against aggression. Objectives: This experimental study examined (1) whether joy- or compassion-based writing exercises can buffer against anger and aggression in response to provocation, (2) whether trait prevention focus (a self-regulation style focused on avoiding negative outcomes) influences these effects, and (3) how positive and negative affect evolve over time. Methods: A total of N = 148 university students were randomly assigned to one of three writing interventions: joy, compassion, or a procedural control. After the writing task, participants were provoked by exposing them to unsolvable anagrams and a standardized provocation by a condescending confederate. Measures of anger, positive affect (PA), and negative affect (NA) were collected at baseline, post-intervention, and post-provocation. Behavioral aggression was assessed post-provocation, using the competitive reaction time task (CRTT). Results: Controlling for baseline levels, neither joy or compassion significantly buffered against increased anger, NA, and behavioral aggression, or against decreased PA after provocation, compared to the control condition. However, affective trajectories differed by condition: In the joy condition, post-intervention PA was significantly higher (compared to the control condition) and NA significantly lower (compared to compassion and control). However, following provocation, PA dropped and NA rose significantly more sharply in the joy condition compared to the other conditions. Prevention focus did not moderate any outcomes. Conclusion: These findings suggest that brief joy and compassion interventions do not buffer against aggression. Compared to inducing compassion, inducing joy does lead to more immediate improved affect, though this impact is only short-lived, potentially illustrating an affective contrast effect. More research is needed to further explore timing, contrast, and longer-term mood effects of prosocial interventions as antidotes to aggression.

Compassion-based interventions are widely used to promote emotional well-being, yet their differential effects on affective arousal level remain poorly understood. The present study examined the immediate affective consequences of brief self- and other-compassion writing exercises, differentiating between positive and negative affect across high- and low-arousal levels. Participants ( N = 230) were randomized to either a self-compassion or an other-compassion condition. General positive affect (PA), high-arousal PA, low-arousal PA, general negative affect (NA), high-arousal NA, and low-arousal NA were assessed before and after the writing task. Mixed ANOVAs with time and conditions as factors were conducted as primary analyses. Results indicated that both conditions were associated with reductions in low-arousal NA, with significantly stronger decreases for self-compassion. Other-compassion additionally showed a significant decrease in high-arousal PA that was not observed in the self-compassion condition. These findings suggest that compassion-based writing exercises produce selective rather than broad immediate affective change, and that practicing compassion for others may carry a short-term affective cost in the form of reduced high-arousal PA. Potentially, this drop in high-arousal PA may function as a barrier to sustained engagement with other-compassion practices, particularly in culture that value high-arousal PA. Pairing other-compassion exercises with activities that boost or restore (high arousal) PA may therefore support more consistent engagement with compassion-based interventions.

Background: Intake assessments vary in their focus on strengths and solutions compared with problems. They provide therapists with first impressions of their clients. Research shows that first impressions may have strong and lasting effects.Aims: To compare how solution- versus problem-focused case descriptions influence therapists’ emotions and initial expectations for successfully working with a client.Methods: Vignettes describing clients were manipulated to focus either on solutions and strengths, or on problems. In a within-subject experimental design, 33 (Sample 1) and 29 (Sample 2) trainee therapists each read four case descriptions (two solution-focused and two problem-focused vignettes; order fully counterbalanced). After each vignette, participants rated their affect and expectations for successfully working with the client.Results: In both samples, solution-focused vignettes were associated with significantly higher levels of positive affect and positive expectations for treatment, and with significantly lower levels of negative affect, compared with problem-focused vignettes. Effect size differences between conditions were generally large (Cohen’s d between .63 and 1.22).Conclusions: Focusing on clients’ goals, their strengths, and actively highlighting better moments and areas of problem-free functioning may increase therapists’ positive emotions and their hope for clients’ successful treatment. A next step is to examine the degree to which these positive short-term effects are, in turn, predictive of better clinical outcomes in therapy. Future research could additionally examine whether supporting therapists to frame clients’ initial assessments in solution-focused ways may be one way to contribute to workforce well-being.

Objectives: Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression (MBCT-D) has been shown to be effective at repairing positive affect deficits in depressed individuals, but the mechanism of action underpinning these changes has not been empirically examined. To address this issue, secondary analyses of two randomised controlled trials in individuals with residual depression were conducted. Method: Study 1 was a cross-sectional mediation analysis of a trial reporting superior effects of MBCT-D to a waitlist control in bolstering momentary positive affect in individuals with residual depression symptoms (n = 130). Study 2 replicated this analysis in the subset of individuals with residual depression symptoms (n = 117) from a second, larger trial comparing MBCT-D to maintenance antidepressants (M-ADM) to prevent depressive relapse that also included a positive affect outcome. Results: In Study 1, an increase in external sensory observing uniquely mediated the superiority of MBCT-D over the control in repairing momentary positive affect. Replicating these findings, in Study 2, MBCT-D was superior to M-ADM at repairing positive affect and this was cross-sectionally mediated by changes in external sensory observing. Conclusions: These findings suggest that one way in which MBCT-D enhances positive affect in individuals with residual depression may be by training the capacity to attend to external sensory experience.

Background: Previous research suggests a relationship between measurement frequency of self-reported depressive symptoms and change in depressive symptom scores for the Beck Depression Inventory II (BDI-II). The goal of the current study was to investigate the differential effects of weekly and monthly completion of the BDI-II and Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology self-report (QIDS-SR). Methods: Seventy individuals diagnosed with major depressive disorder (MDD) waiting for treatment were randomly assigned to either completing BDI-II weekly, BDI-II monthly, QIDS-SR weekly, or QIDS-SR monthly for a duration of nine weeks. After nine weeks participants also completed the Zung depression scale once. Mixed multilevel regression modelling and Bayesian Statistical Analysis were used to test the relationship between the measurement frequency and depression scores, and to compare scores of the repeatedly completed instruments with the instrument completed only in week nine.Results: Measurement frequency was not related to BDI-II, QIDS-SR or Zung scores. However, depression scores declined in the weekly and monthly QIDS-SR (but not BDI-II) conditions, while Bayesian analyses indicated moderate support for equal depression scores on the Zung SDS.Limitations: Lack of a clinician-rated depression scale at week nine in addition to the self-report measure. Conclusion: In contrast to previous studies in non-clinical samples, our findings suggest that measurement frequency does not have an impact on scores of the BDI-II. Implications for clinical studies monitoring depressive symptom scores with self-report scales are discussed. Keywords: major depressive disorder; retest effects; measurement error; measurement frequency; Beck Depression Inventory; Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology

Social isolation and depression are tightly linked and can reinforce each other in a vicious cycle. Yet, the antecedents of this complex cycle are not well understood. To date, little is known about how the dynamics of social isolation in daily life (i.e., solitude) play a role in this cycle. To investigate these complex dynamics, we introduce the concept of solitude inertia, which captures individuals' tendencies to remain in social states of solitude. We argue that, although short-term solitude can have both positive and negative effects on individuals' depressive symptoms, prolonged states of solitude (i.e., high solitude inertia) are detrimental. At the same time, individuals with depression might be more vulnerable to "get stuck" in solitude. In this study, we tease apart the bidirectional relationship between solitude inertia and depressive symptoms. We use data from the MindMaastricht study in which 129 individuals with residual depressive symptoms participated in two experience sampling assessments phases (T1 and T2) that were 8 weeks apart (Nobs = 11,558). Using logistic multilevel models, we find that higher levels of depressive symptoms are related to higher solitude inertia. We further show that depressive symptoms at T1 are not predictive of solitude inertia at T2. However, solitude inertia at T1 was predictive of depressive symptoms eight weeks later (T2) in a linear regression analysis. This study introduces and highlights the role of solitude inertia as a potential intervention target in social isolation and depression dynamics. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).