Impairments in episodic future thinking for positive events and anticipatory pleasure in major depression

doi:10.1016/j.jad.2019.09.039

Journal of Affective Disorders

Volume 260, 1 January 2020, Pages 536-543

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2019.09.039 Get rights and content

Highlights

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Deficits were found in episodic future thinking in depression, relative to controls.
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Deficits were found in anticipatory pleasure in depression, relative to controls.
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Characteristics of episodic future thinking predicted pleasure for future events.
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Enhancing episodic future thinking may improve anticipatory pleasure in depression.

Abstract

Background

Characteristic of the cardinal symptom of anhedonia, people with clinical depression report lower levels of anticipatory pleasure. However, the psychological mechanisms underlying these deficits are poorly understood. This is the first study to assess whether, and to what extent, phenomenological characteristics of episodic future thinking for positive future events are associated with anticipatory pleasure among depressed individuals.

Methods

Individuals with a Major Depressive Episode (MDE; N = 117) and without (N = 47) completed ratings scales for depressive symptoms and trait anticipatory and consummatory pleasure. They then provided descriptions of personally-relevant positive future events and rated them for phenomenological characteristics and state anticipatory pleasure.

Results

Between-groups analysis showed that those with MDE reported lower trait anticipatory and consummatory pleasure. They also simulated future events with less specificity, less detail/vividness, less use of mental imagery, less use of first-person perspective, less plausibility/perceived likelihood of occurring, and reported less associated state anticipatory pleasure. In regression analyses in the depressed group, lower scores for detail/vividness, mental imagery, and personal significance all uniquely predicted lower state anticipatory pleasure.

Limitations

Cognitive functioning was not assessed, which may help clarify deficits that underpin these findings. History of previous depressive episodes in the comparison group were not assessed, which may mean the observed between-group effects are underestimated.

Conclusions

This study provides further evidence of deficits in episodic future thinking and anticipatory pleasure in depressed individuals. It also establishes links between particular characteristics of episodic future thinking and state anticipatory pleasure, and indicates cognitive targets that may be amenable to intervention in order to reduce anhedonia.

Section snippets

Participants

Recent meta-analytic evidence shows large differences between people with and without depression in anticipatory pleasure (Hallford and Sharma, 2019). As such, we aimed to recruit at least 50 individuals to each group to be powered to detect at least medium sized between-groups effects, with 80% power and an alpha level of 0.05. To detect a medium sized effect in anticipatory pleasure using the episodic future thinking predictors of interest in a multiple regression model, with 80% power and

Between-groups analyses

Table 1 shows the descriptive statistics and the results of the ANCOVA analyses. As expected, the depressed group reported significantly higher depressive symptoms. The depressed group also reported significantly lower trait anticipatory and consummatory pleasure on the TEPS compared to the non-depressed group, to a large and moderate-to-large degree, respectively. The depressed group also reported significantly less state EFT-T anticipatory pleasure following episodic future thinking for

Funding

The authors received no funding from an external source.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

D.J. Hallford: Conceptualization, Methodology, Data curation, Formal analysis, Writing - original draft, Writing - review & editing. T.J. Barry: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. D.W. Austin: Writing - review & editing. F. Raes: Writing - review & editing. K. Takano: Writing - review & editing. B. Klein: Writing - review & editing.

Declaration of Competing Interest

None.

Acknowledgments

None

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Research paperImpairments in episodic future thinking for positive events and anticipatory pleasure in major depression

Highlights

Abstract

Background

Methods

Results

Limitations

Conclusions

Section snippets

Participants

Between-groups analyses

Funding

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Declaration of Competing Interest

Acknowledgments

Trends Neurosci.

Behav. Res. Therapy

J. Affect. Disord.

Conscious. Cogn.

Psychiatry Res

Intern. Intervent.

Schizophr. Res.

J. Res. Pers.

Neuropsychologia

Behav. Res. Therapy

Clin. Psychol. Rev.

Clin. Psychol. Rev.

Ann. Gen. Psychiatry

Prog. Neuropsychopharmacol. Biol. Psychiatry

Neuropsychologia

Gen. Hosp. Psychiatry

J. Anxiety Disord.

Auton. Neurosci.

J. Behav. Ther. Exp. Psychiatry

Behav. Res. Therapy

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Adv. Exp. Soc. Psychol.

Psychiatry Res.

J. Affect. Disord.

Prog. Neuropsychopharmacol. Biol. Psychiatry

Do strategic processes contribute to the specificity of future simulation in depression?

Br. J. Clin. Psychol.

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental disorders: DSM-IV-TR

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental disorders, 5th Edition (DSM-5)

Frequency, characteristics, and perceived functions of emotional future thinking in daily life

Q. J. Exp. Psychol.

Controlling the false discovery rate: a practical and powerful approach to multiple testing

J. Roy. Statis. Soc. Ser. B (Methodol.)

Less positive or more negative? Future-directed thinking in mild to moderate depression

Cogn. Behav. Therapy

Positive imagery-based cognitive bias modification as a web-based treatment tool for depressed adults: a randomized controlled trial

Clin. Psychol. Sci.

Statistical Power Analysis For the Behavioral Sciences

Research paper
Impairments in episodic future thinking for positive events and anticipatory pleasure in major depression