title: Depressive thinking: shifts in construct accessibility or in schematic mental models?
abstract: Alternative explanations for depression-related changes in thinking were examined. Forty-one depressed patients and 40 controls completed sentence stems involving social approval or personal achievement such as "If I could always be right then others would __ me." The view that depressive thinking primarily reflects a generalized increase in accessibility of negative constructs predicts patients will give more negative completions (e.g., "dislike"). Alternatively, depression could affect the interrelationships between constructs: Use in depression of schematic mental models implying closer dependence of personal worth--acceptance on success--approval predicts patients may give more positive completions (e.g., "like"). Results supported the latter prediction and suggest that depressive thinking reflects changes in high-level mental models used to interpret experience.
authors.affiliation: Medical Research Council Applied Psychology Unit, Cambridge, England.
authors.forename: J D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Teasdale
authors.forename: M J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Cooper
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hayhurst
authors.forename: E S
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Paykel
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D013850:Thinking