Past Negative Events Research Articles

RELAX (REducing Levels of AnXiety): a study protocol for a parallel two-arm randomised controlled trial evaluating a web-based early intervention for pregnant women with high levels of repetitive negative thinking to prevent escalating anxiety during pregnancy and after birth

BackgroundPerinatal anxiety is common: up to 40% of pregnant women and new mothers experience high levels of anxiety. Given its prevalence, interventions that are low-intensity, highly accessible and cost-efficient, and target modifiable risk factors for anxiety are needed. Repetitive negative thinking (RNT)—such as worrying about ways things will go wrong in the future or ruminating about past negative events—is a risk factor for the development of anxiety. RNT is maintained by the tendency to generate negative interpretations of ambiguous situations.MethodsA parallel two-arm randomised controlled trial will assess the efficacy of adding interpretation training (RELAX) to usual maternity care. Participants (N = 268) will be randomised to (i) 12 sessions of online interpretation training (RELAX) plus usual care, or (ii) usual care alone. We will assess anxiety, depression, RNT, and work and social adjustment at baseline, plus 4, 8 and 36 weeks later.DiscussionShould the intervention result in lower levels of anxiety than usual care, it could be an accessible, cost-effective way to help women who are vulnerable to experiencing anxiety in the perinatal period.Trial registrationISRCTN 12754931. Registered 25th May 2023, prior to recruitment.

Seizing and freezing to life outcomes: Need for cognitive closure intensifies affective reactions to major events

Research shows that significant well-being disparities emerge between individuals who experience major negative events and those who undergo major positive events. However, such differences may vary among individuals. Drawing from the theory of the need for cognitive closure (NFC), we theorize and test whether NFC, which captures seizing and freezing on salient information to reach a fast conclusion, intensifies the differences in affective well-being between those who experience negative or positive events. Across three studies (total N = 2,399), we provide converging evidence that supports our theoretical claim. We first found that participants with high (vs. low) NFC show a greater affective well-being gap between those who recalled their past negative and positive major events (Study 1). We also discovered consistent patterns when participants were provided with negative or positive major event scenarios (Study 2). Lastly, we further substantiated our findings by utilizing a longitudinal study of the 20th presidential election in South Korea (Study 3). Over a 6-week period, the well-being gaps between the supporters of the election winner and the runner-up were more pronounced among individuals with higher NFC. Overall, our findings have implications for identifying a novel psychological trait that influences the affective well-being gaps following significant events in one’s life.

Revisiting negative experiences: A sociocultural cognitive framework

AbstractSeveral researchers have demonstrated that revisiting and making meaning out of negative experiences can be helpful, while others have suggested that such “dwelling in the past” (e.g., rumination) is associated with a range of negative outcomes, such as depression. In addition to such inconsistent findings, negative effects of revisiting negative experiences have been shown to be weaker in non‐Western cultures compared to Western cultures. This paper employs a sociocultural cognitive framework to understand the mechanisms of such cultural differences, as well as potentially shed light on some of the paradoxes behind revisiting negative experiences observed in Western cultures. We specified how the different perspectives towards change, context, and contradiction between holistic/dialectical versus analytic thinking styles may have an impact on the effects of recalling and reflecting upon past negative events. We integrated a wide range of empirical evidence that implies how the cognitive differences serve as mechanisms for cultural differences in revisiting negative experiences, generated a set of hypotheses, and outlined possible directions for future research.

Ruminating on the past may be bad for you, or is it? Implications of past negative time perspective on job-related stress

Past negative time perspective (PNTP), characterized by rumination on painful past experiences, is generally considered harmful to a person’s well-being. However, there is reason to suspect that a PNTP may not make matters worse if a high PNTP is consistent with culture, as in the case of India. Drawing on the person–culture matching hypothesis, we test the moderating effects of PNTP on the relationship between role stressors and both psychological strain and organizational outcomes among Indian employees in India ( n = 253). Two smaller comparison groups of Asian Indians and US-born Americans in the USA were also evaluated to anchor the understanding of the Indians’ score on PNTP. This comparison is particularly important given that pressures of globalization on India’s culture have created a sustained sense of uncertainty for Indians. Results indicate that the mean score on PNTP is greater for Indians than for US-born Americans ( n = 56) and US-Indians ( n = 69). Furthermore, having a low PNTP intensified the adverse outcomes due to stressors, whereas a high PNTP had no further impact. Findings suggest that although having an overall PNTP is not ideal, not reflecting on past negative events to cope with current stressors could also be problematic within the Indian context where PNTP is normative. Thus, in a PNTP country, a person’s high PNTP has no more adverse effect as stressors increase.

Mother- and Father-Child Reminiscing About Past Events Involving Pain, Fear, and Sadness: Observational Cohort Study.

Pain in childhood is prevalent and is associated with fear, particularly in the context of injuries or procedural pain, and negative emotions (e.g., sadness). Pain and fear share a bidirectional relationship, wherein fear exacerbates the experience of pain and pain increases subsequent anticipatory fear. The existing research has focused primarily on children's immediate experience of pain and fear. Research on how children remember or talk about past painful, fearful, or sad events is lacking. Parent-child reminiscing about past pain has been demonstrated to differ from reminiscing about other past negative emotional events (i.e., those involving sadness, but not fear). The present study aimed to examine differences in how parent-child dyads reminisce about past pain, fear, and sadness. One hundred and three 4-year-old children (55% girls) and their parents (52% fathers) engaged in a narrative elicitation task in which they reminisced about unique past events involving pain, fear, and sadness. Parent-child narratives were coded using established coding schemes based on the developmental psychology literature. Parent-child narratives about pain were characterized by fewer emotion-laden words and explanations, as well as more pain-related words compared to sadness or fearful narratives. Mothers and fathers reminisced with sons and daughters in a similar way across all types of events. Parent-children reminiscing about past painful events differs from reminiscing about other types of distressing events (e.g., involving sadness or fear). This highlights a possibility of differential socialization of pain versus fear. Potential clinical implications of the findings are discussed.

Forgotten Variables and Older Men in Custody: Negative Childhood Events, Forgiveness, and Religiosity.

The study tested a mediational model linking negative childhood events through forgiveness of self and social support to religiosity using data from a convenience sample of 261 men aged 45-82 years residing behind prison walls. The Developmental Model of Adaptation provided the study's conceptual model for investigating the associations among the study variables. The study tested a mediational model linking the distal past (negative childhood events) to the outcome, religiosity, through forgiveness, and social support. The final model demonstrated the association of negative childhood events with religiosity through forgiveness of self (not forgiveness of others or situation) and social support. The study's findings suggest that at intake and during time in confinement, middle-aged and older men in prison should be assessed for and offered interventions aimed at helping them cope with the trauma of childhood events, achieve self-forgiveness, seek social support, and express religiosity as important for sustaining their well-being.

Prospective Memory and Positivity Bias in the COVID-19 Health Crisis: The Effects of Aging.

This study aimed to determine whether the observed tendency to remember more positive than negative past events (positivity phenomena) also appears when recalling hypothetical events about the future. In this study, young, middle-aged, and older adults were presented with 28 statements about the future associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, half positive and half negative. In addition, half of these statements were endowed with personal implications while the other half had a more social connotations. Participants rated their agreement/disagreement with each statement and, after a distraction task, they recalled as many statements as possible. There was no difference in the agreement ratings between the three age groups, but the participants agreed with positive statements more than with negative ones and they identified more with statements of social content than of personal content. The younger and older individuals recalled more statements than the middle-aged people. More importantly, older participants recalled more positive than negative statements (positivity effect), and showed a greater tendency to turn negative statements into more positive or neutral ones (positivity bias). These findings showed that the positivity effect occurs in even such complex and situations as the present pandemic, especially in older adults. The results are discussed by reference to the notion of commission errors and false memories resulting from the activation of cognitive biases.

Mother-Child Reminiscing and First-Graders’ Emotion Competence in a Low-Income and Ethnically Diverse Sample

ABSTRACT Parent-child reminiscing talk about positive and negative events provides children with unique opportunities to develop emotion competence. Very little work has involved families from low-income households and ethnically diverse backgrounds. We examined: 1) event valence (positive vs. negative) and ethnic differences in mother-child reminiscing talk; 2) relations between maternal reminiscing talk and child emotion references; and 3) relations between maternal reminiscing talk and child emotion understanding. Participants were 204 African American, Dominican, Mexican and Chinese mothers and their first-grade children (M age = 79.50 months) from low-income households. Mother-child dyads were videorecorded talking about past positive and negative shared events. Conversations were coded for the emotion content and style of mother reminiscing talk and child emotion references. Child emotion understanding was assessed using an emotion-labeling and emotion perspective-taking task. Mothers differed in their use of emotion content and reminiscing style by event valence and ethnicity. Mothers who used more emotion content during positive and negative events had children who produced more emotion references. Maternal reminiscing style (i.e., use of evaluations and repetitions) related to child emotion references. Maternal emotion content and reminiscing style did not relate to child emotion understanding. Findings highlight the role of mother-child reminiscing talk in the development of children’s emotion competence.

Subcultural, ideological, and valence-based differences in caregiver reminiscing functions

ABSTRACT Researchers have identified cultural differences in caregiver beliefs about the functions of parent–child reminiscing. However, this work has largely been limited to comparisons between Asian or Asian American and European American caregivers discussing autobiographical events, broadly. In the present study, 365 caregivers of 3- to 12-year-old children from four U.S. subcultures (African, Asian, European, and Hispanic/LatinX) reported about the functions of discussing positive and negative past events with their child, and about their collectivist values. Overall, positive events were discussed more often than negative events and all reminiscing functions were endorsed more strongly for positive events. European Americans endorsed directive functions for positive events least of the three primary functions, and endorsed them less than the other three subcultural groups. All four subculture groups endorsed directive functions equally and more strongly than other functions when discussing negative events. More collectivist attitudes predicted stronger endorsement of all conversation functions except directive functions for negative events. This research is poised to expand our understanding of how caregivers from different subcultural groups, and with different culture-based values, may attempt to shape their children’s worldview through reminiscing and how the functions caregivers emphasise shift depending on the valence of the event under discussion.

DEVELOPMENT OF A NEW RUMINATION SCALE

A new Brief Rumination Scale was constructed to measure rumination as repetitive thoughts about negative past events and regrets. Its good psychometric properties were established in a heterogeneous Bulgarian sample of 1274 healthy individuals – one-factor structure, high enough internal consistency, proven convergent, discriminant and intentional validity. It was found that rumination decreased with past positive time orientation and present hedonistic time orientation. Rumination increased with past negative time orientation and proneness to dysfunctional impulsivity. Regarding social differences in rumination, it was found that the participants whose income was above the medium (but not the highest one) and who were living in cities with more than 50,000 inhabitants were more prone to moderate rumination than expected – they emphasized on unfavorable events in their past and expressed regret about more omitted opportunities in their life. A brief, valid and reliable measure of rumination would shorten the process of conducting a study and would make it more probable the subjects to agree to participate in the study in this way enriching the scientific knowledge. Keywords: dysfunctional impulsivity, rumination measurement, scale development, time orientation

Using hypnoanalysis and guided imagery to identify and manage emotional aspects of multiple sclerosis

BackgroundTo date, no studies have used hypnosis to examine and manage the potential emotional causes of multiple sclerosis (MS) in the scientific field; therefore, we decided to compare the effectiveness of hypnoanalysis and guided imagery for determining and manage these emotional causes. MethodsFifteen participants with severe MS were included and assigned into 2 groups: hypnoanalysis and guided imagery. In the hypnoanalysis group, the participants underwent 10 hypnotic sessions to understand events related to the cause of the disease, which were restructured (the events were modified by adding the psychological resources that each involved person needed); in addition, other techniques were used to investigate the causes and solutions according to the participants’ unconscious. The guided imagery group received 10 group sessions of body relaxation and guided imagery, which were recorded for practice at home. Outcome measures, namely, disability (the Expanded Disability Status Scale, EDSS), quality of life (QoL, measured with the SF-36) and number of relapses, were evaluated 4 months previous the intervention, at baseline, post-intervention, and 3 months later. ResultsHypnoanalysis revealed that stressful events and psychoemotional maladaptive patterns acted as causal, detonating, or aggravating factors of disease, and psychoemotional changes were the most frequent and varied solutions. No changes were observed in disability between the two groups. The guided imagery group showed an improvement in 2 subscales of QoL when compared with the hypnoanalysis group (which disappeared at the follow-up); this difference is probably due to the increased number of sessions and probably due to psychoemotional maladaptive patterns being more frequently mentioned than difficult circumstances in life and/or unsolved past events. However, the techniques used in hypnoanalysis were effective in understanding the potential emotional causes of MS, which showed high intra- and inter-participant consistency. ConclusionsThe daily use of guided imagery overcame the restructuring of negative past events to improve QoL in patients with MS. Trial registrationACTRN12618002024224 (retrospectively registered)

Experience of Administering Life Grid in the Qualitative Interviews with Adolescent Children of Parents with Mental Illness.

Background:Methodological literature on qualitative research with children and young people suggests that traditional data collection methods can be strengthened through the use of creative and task-based methods. This article discusses the experience of using one such task-based method called the life grid, to explore the experiences of adolescent children who have a parent with psychotic illness, in the Indian context.Methods:The life grid was adapted for the present study and used with 24 adolescents aged 15–19 years. Feedback about their experience was collected on a five-point rating scale and via open-ended questions. The researchers’ observations and reflections were noted down as field notes.Results:A majority of the adolescents (83%) reported liking the activity. They appreciated the opportunity to use the life grid to generate a holistic perspective of their lives. Difficulties in recalling negative past events and language barriers were some of the challenges in the activity.Conclusions:The life grid appears to be an appropriate and useful tool for qualitative research with adolescents in India. This article contributes to ongoing discussions over culturally relevant methodologies and issues among child researchers in India.

Differential contribution of anterior and posterior midline regions during mental simulation of counterfactual and perspective shifts in autobiographical memories

Retrieving autobiographical memories induces a natural tendency to mentally simulate alternate versions of past events, either by reconstructing the perceptual details of the originally experienced perspective or the conceptual information of what actually occurred. Here we examined whether the episodic system recruited during imaginative experiences functionally dissociates depending on the nature of this reconstruction. Using fMRI, we evaluated differential patterns of neural activity and hippocampal connectivity when twenty-nine participants naturally recalled past negative events, shifted visual perspective, or imagined better or worse outcomes than what actually occurred. We found that counterfactual thoughts were distinguished by neural recruitment in dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, whereas shifts in visual perspective were uniquely supported by the precuneus. Additionally, connectivity with the anterior hippocampus changed depending upon the mental simulation that was performed – with enhanced hippocampal connectivity with medial prefrontal cortex for counterfactual simulations and precuneus for shifted visual perspectives. Together, our findings provide a novel assessment of differences between these common methods of mental simulation and a more detailed account for the neural network underlying episodic retrieval and reconstruction.

Self-Compassion and Time Perception of Past Negative Events

This study examined relationships among self-compassion, subjective distance, and time perception related to past negative events. Self-compassion involves a broad, mindful understanding of suffering without getting entangled in suffering. Therefore, self-compassion might enable people to feel subjectively distant from past adverse events and help them develop adaptive emotional reactions and time perception (i.e., meaning-making about time) concerning the events. Two hundred eighty-two participants were randomly assigned to a negative (n = 139) or a positive (n = 143) event condition. After completing measures of self-compassion and self-esteem, they recalled either a negative or a positive event and estimated how far away they subjectively felt from that event. They also indicated the elapsed time from the event and responded to items assessing their emotional reactions and meaning-making about time. Self-compassion was associated with greater subjective distance from negative events, r = −.23, p = .005. Moreover, greater subjective distance mediated the relations of self-compassion to lower negative emotional reactions, B = − 0.147, 95% CI [− 0.292, − 0.034], and lower tendency to think that time was wasted on negative events, B = − 0.053, 95% CI [− 0.146, − 0.008]. Importantly, self-compassion was not related to subjective distance from positive events, r = .11, p = .182. Results imply that people with high self-compassion would likely feel subjectively distant from past adverse events, which might help prevent negative meaning-making about time and negative emotional reactions concerning the events.

Effects of Expressive Writing on Neural Processing During Learning.

Expressive writing about past negative events has been shown to lead to a slew of positive outcomes. However, little is known about why writing about something negative would have positive effects. While some have posited that telling a narrative of a past negative event or current anxiety “frees up” cognitive resources, allowing individuals to focus more on the task at hand, there is little neural evidence suggesting that expressive writing has an effect on cognitive load. Moreover, little is known about how individual differences in the content of expressive writing could affect neural processing and the cognitive benefits writing confers. In our experiment, we compared brain activity in a group that had engaged in expressive writing vs. a control group, during performance on a feedback-based paired-associate word-learning task. We found that across groups, differential activation in the dorsal striatum in response to positive vs. negative feedback significantly predicted better later memory. Moreover, writing about a past failure resulted in more activation relative to the control group during the learning task in the mid-cingulate cortex (MCC), an area of the brain crucial to processing negative emotion. While our results do not provide support for the assertion that expressive writing alters attentional processing, our findings suggest that choosing to write about particularly intense past negative experiences like a difficult past failure may have resulted in changes in neural activation during task processing.

Measuring Parents’ Elaborative Reminiscing: Differential Links of Parents’ Elaboration to children’s Autobiographical Memory and Socioemotional Skills

ABSTRACTParents’ elaboration plays an important role in autobiographical memory and socioemotional development. Two types of coding approaches have been used to assess parents’ elaboration: a frequency-based coding (absolute frequencies of different types of elaborative utterances) and a scale-based coding (a 5-point scale based on relative frequencies of types of questions). We examined whether these two coding approaches were related and whether they were differentially associated with child autobiographical memory and socioemotional skills. Sixty-eight preschoolers (M = 50.32) reminisced about positive and negative past events, with their parents and with a researcher. Parents’ elaboration was assessed using the frequency- and scale-based coding approaches. Child autobiographical memory and emotion references were assessed in shared recall (parent–child conversations). Child autobiographical memory was also assessed in independent recall (researcher-child conversations). Child emotion regulation was assessed using the Challenging Situation task. The two coding approaches were moderately related. Parents’ elaboration was related to child autobiographical memory and emotion references in shared recall, regardless of the coding approach. Whereas the frequency-based coding was uniquely related to child memory in the independent recall, the scale-based coding was uniquely related to child emotion regulation. Implications of using diverse coding approaches to understand the role of parents in child development are discussed.

Narrative Identity Development and Desistance from Illegal Behavior among Substance-Using Female Offenders: Implications for Narrative Therapy and Creating Opportunity

According to narrative identity theory, to desist from breaking the law, offenders must fashion a prosocial identity through a process of redemption by “making good” of past negative events. To improve understanding of women offenders’ redemption, analyses were conducted of the life stories and the identity change those stories revealed for 118 U.S. women with histories of multiple criminal convictions. Women most often described redemption from illegal activity and substance misuse, distress and trauma, and the challenges of giving birth and parenting. They rarely described redemption in educational and employment settings. The numbers and types of accounts of redemption did not explain desistance. However, qualitative analyses showed important differences in the redemption accounts of women who did and did not desist. Persisters’ stories of redemption tended to lack coherence and revealed tendencies to minimize both the negative effects of illegal behavior and the connection of illegal behavior to identities. Desisters’ accounts emphasized women’s strong motivations to change and their efforts to distance their current from their prior selves, steer internal change, and identify valuable prosocial qualities in themselves. Promising treatment interventions include support for women’s development of coherent life stories and autonomy support to increase motivation to change. Findings also suggest the need for policy change to increase both employment opportunities for women offenders and programs that provide employment and education that promote prosocial identity development.

A Discrete Emotions Perspective to Negative Autobiographical Recall among Younger and Older Adults

ABSTRACTBackground: The discrete emotions approach predicts differential relevance of anger and sadness experiences to well-being between younger and older adults (anger more relevant in young adulthood, sadness more relevant in old age).Methods: We tested these assumptions within a semi-guided autobiographical recall task among a sample of younger and older adults. Participants recalled a series of 50 negative past life events that were categorized as to the primary emotion elicited. Phenomenological ratings included assessments of event negativity, positivity, vividness, and age at which the event occurred.Results: Contrary to expectations, there were no age differences in the ratio of anger and sadness experiences, as well as perceived negativity and vividness. However, perceived positivity of sadness events was higher among older relative to younger adults.Conclusion: We discuss the present results in terms of how various emotional events maintain their representational nature in old age, while certain events could be particularly unique to divergent age-related well-being outcomes.

Retrieval of negative autobiographical memories is associated with hostile attributions in ambiguous situations amongst people with schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is characterised by difficulty understanding the thoughts and intentions of other people. Misunderstandings could lead people to attribute hostility to others’ actions. Theories suggest that we use our autobiographical memories to inform our understanding of other people but no study has examined the relation between memory and hostile attributions in schizophrenia. People with (n = 42) and without (n = 34) schizophrenia diagnoses completed The Ambiguous Intentions and Hostility Questionnaire (AIHQ) to assess their tendency to attribute hostility to other people’s actions and the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) to assess their ability to recall specific positive and negative autobiographical memories. In linear regressions the interaction between diagnostic group and the proportion of specific negative memories participants retrieved explained significant variance in each AIHQ index. Follow-up correlation analyses showed that participants with schizophrenia who retrieved more negative memories also attributed greater hostility to other people’s actions (r = 0.47) and reported that they would respond with greater aggression (r = 0.59). These correlations were in the opposite direction for controls. People with schizophrenia may use their memories for negative past events to understand the actions and intentions of other people, leading to attributions of hostility for otherwise benign actions.

Focusing on the future from afar: Self-distancing from future stressors facilitates adaptive coping.

Prior research indicates that visual self-distancing enhances adaptive self-reflection about negative past events (Kross & Ayduk, 2011). However, whether this process is similarly useful when people reflect on anxiety-provoking future negative experiences, and if so, whether a similar set of mechanisms underlie its benefits in this context, is unknown. Here we addressed these questions using a combination of experimental and individual difference methods with adults and adolescents (total N = 2,344). In Studies 1 and 2, spontaneous self-distancing predicted less anxious emotional reactivity among adults and adolescents. This effect was mediated by differences in how vividly participants imagined a future anxiety-provoking event. Study 3 provided causal evidence in an adult sample: Adopting a self-distanced (vs. self-immersed) perspective when reflecting on a future stressor led to lower levels of anxiety as well as lower imagery vividness. Consistent with Studies 1 and 2, reductions in imagery vividness mediated the emotion regulatory benefits of self-distancing. A meta-analysis of all three studies further confirmed these findings across samples. Thus, the current studies extend previous research on the benefits of self-distancing to future stressors. In addition, they highlight a novel mechanism for this relation: imagery vividness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).