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Cognitive Etiology of Major Depressive Disorder - Coggle Diagram
Cognitive Etiology of Major Depressive Disorder
Alloy et al. (1999)
Procedure
Alloy studied the thinking styles of young Americans in their early 20’s for 6 years.
Their thinking style was tested and they were placed in either the
‘positive thinking group’
or
‘negative thinking group’
.
Results
After 6 years the researchers found:
1% of the 'positive' group developed depression.
17% of the ‘negative’ group developed depression
These results indicate there may be a link between cognitive style and development of depression.
Evaluation and Conclusion
The study may suffer from demand characteristics. The results could also be correlational. It is important to remember that the precise role of cognitive processes is yet to be determined in terms of the study.
The maladaptive cognitions seen in depressed people may be a consequence rather than a cause of depression.
Aaron Beck (1967)
3 mechanisms responsible for depression were identified.
The Cognitive Triad
(of negative automatic thinking)
The three forms of negative thinking that are typical of individuals with depression.
These interfere with normal cognitive processing, leading to impairments in perception, memory, and problem solving.
Negative view of the self
:
Depressed individuals tend to view themselves as helpless, worthless, and inadequate.
Negative view of the future
:
Depressed individuals see the future as totally hopeless because their worthlessness will prevent their situation from improving.
Negative view of the world
:
Depressed individuals interpret the world in a unrealistic, negative, and defeatist way.
Negative Self-Schemas
Beck believed that depression prone individuals develop a set of beliefs and expectations about themselves that are negative and pessimistic.
Negative schemas may be acquired in childhoold as a result of traumatic events such as:
death of a parent or sibling, parental rejection, or bullying at school.
Errors in Logic
People with negative self schemas become prone to making
logical errors
in their thinking and they tend to focus selectively on certain aspects of a situation while ignoring equally relevant information.
Arbitrary Inference
:
Drawing a negative conclusion in the absence of supporting data.
Selective Abstraction
:
Focusing on the worst aspects of any situation.
Magnification and Minimisation:
If they have a problem they make it appear bigger than it is. If they have a solution they make it smaller.
Personalization:
Negative events are interpreted
as their fault.
Dichotomous Thinking:
Everything is seen as black and white.There is no in between.
Martin Seligman (1974)
Learned helplessness theory:
depression occurs when a person learns that their attempts to escape negative situations make no difference.
As a consequence the person becomes passive and will endure aversive stimuli or environments even when escape is possible.
Procedure
A dog put into a partitioned cage learns to escape when the floor is electrified.
If the dog is restrained whilst being shocked it eventually stops trying to escape.
Evaluation and Conclusion
Seligman explained depression in humans in terms of learned helplessness, whereby the individual gives up trying to influence their environment because they have learned that they are helpless as a consequence of having no control over what happens to them.
Although Seligman’s account may explain depression to a certain extent, it fails to take into account cognitions.
Results
Dogs subjected to inescapable electric shocks later failed to escape from shocks even when it was possible to do so.
Moreover, they exhibited some of the symptoms of depression found in humans (lethargy, sluggishness, passive in the face of stress and appetite loss).
Abramson, Seligman, and Teasdale (1978)
The cognitive version of the theory was reformulated through learned helplessness in terms of
attributional processes.
The depression attributional style is based on 3 dimensions:
1. locus:
whether the cause is internal - to do with a person themselves, or external - to do with some aspect of the situation
2. stability:
whether the cause is stable and permanent or unstable and transient
3. global or specific:
whether the cause relates to the 'whole' person or just some particular feature characteristic
Abramson et al. argued that people who attribute failure to internal, stable, and global causes are more likely to become depressed than those who attribute failure to external, unstable and specific causes.
This is because the former attributional style (external, unstable and specific) leads people to the conclusion that they are unable to change things for the better.
Example: Someone stole your phone.
external - you were in a notoriously unsafe environment
unstable - you were randomly chosen for the theft
specific - it happened during a Christmas rush sale
Other studies on depression
Joiner et al (1996)
Patterns of cognition alone are not enough to lead to depression, they must also be in response to environmental stimuli.
Nolen-Hoeksema (2000)
Rumination appears to more consistently predict the onset of depression rather than the duration, but rumination in combination with negative cognitive styles can predict the duration of depressive symptoms.
Farb et al (2011)
Relapsing patients showed more activity in a frontal region of the brain, known as the medial prefrontal gyrus. These responses were also linked to higher rumination.