Souvenirs intrusifs au cours des troubles de l’humeur

Abstract

AM retrieval is a reconstruction process that grounds the self by providing coherent narratives organized to elicit a sense of identity across the time. Major depression is associated with impairments of AM retrieval, combining a mood congruent recall, a lack of specificity, an increased prevalence of the third-person visual perspective and frequent intrusive memories, which are characterized by an involuntary, fast and effortless recall. Intrusive memories in depression relate to a broad range of negative life events and are usually vivid, distressful and associated with a poorer outcome as well as with typical depressogenic cognitive biases, especially with cognitive avoidance. To date, little is known about the neural bases of these memories. These bases are likely to partially mirror those of the depressive state, with a decreased cognitive control over unwanted thoughts by the prefrontal cortex and an increased amygdala activation.