None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
The purpose of our project is to better understand the effect of thinking about upcoming events on how much pleasure people anticipate they will bring them, and whether this leads to engaging in more positive activities. Participants with a depressive disorder will complete surveys asking them to describe upcoming activities a number of times during the day over a two week period. In the second half of this week they will also be asked to complete brief tasks to focus their thinking on these positive activities. We hypothesise that focused mental simulation of future positive activities will improve anticipation of pleasure, and increase engagement in such activities, and improve depressed mood.
Interventions
Participants will be recruited from inpatient and outpatient settings at the adult mental health service of the National Institute for Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bengaluru, India.
The intervention will consist of a series of brief questions asking participants to provide some detail about the upcoming positive events they anticipate might happen (e.g., what will happen, who will be there, how will you feel, have you enjoyed this before). The intervention is designed to stimulate episodic
Participants will be recruited from inpatient and outpatient settings at the adult mental health service of the National Institute for Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bengaluru, India. The intervention will consist of a series of brief questions asking participants to provide some detail about the upcoming positive events they anticipate might happen (e.g., what will happen, who will be there, how will you feel, have you enjoyed this before). The intervention is designed to stimulate episodic future thinking about the upcoming event in order to increase anticipated pleasure. This will be implemented as part of monitoring of activity over a 14 day period for depressed individuals recruited from an adult mental health service. After providing informed consent participants will be randomised to a Phase B start-point, which will be after a minimum of 30 Phase A observations (6 days). Phase B will commence, at the latest, after 55 observations (11 days), and therefore last a minimum of 15 observations (3 days). The actual start-point, and therefore the length of the respective phases, will be randomly determined. Participants will be asked to engage in monitoring of their activity over the 14 days, and over this period, dependent on what start-point they were randomized to, they will switch from Phase A to Phase B. Participants will receive email links to online surveys 5 times per day (8:30am, 11:30am, 2pm, 4:30pm, and 7pm). Each survey will ask them to indicate what activity they are most looking forward to in the next 2 hours. They will choose from a list of options for each activity (e.g., work/school/study, media/tv/internet, and conversation/socialising, specified other). Participants will then complete a brief series of questions relating to the upcoming positive activity, including how vivid their mental image was, how easy it was to think of the activity, how pleasurable they think it will be, their intention to engage in it, and their current affect. At each prompt they will be also be asked whether or not they engaged in the previously nominated activity, and how enjoyable it was. The surveys are expected to take 3-5 minutes to complete, and the future thinking task approximately 2-4 minutes. -In Phase A, participants will complete the surveys -In Phase B, participants will complete these surveys, and also engage in a future thinking task after they nominate the upcoming positive activity. This task will involve mentally simulating the positive activity through a series of online written prompts as part of the survey, and including questions such as 'who will be there', 'what will happen', 'why might you enjoy it', 'what emotion might you feel' etc. All participants will start in Phase A and then switch to Phase B at some point. If participants fail to complete several surveys in a row they will be contacted with a phone call to assess for any complicating factors in adherence. At the cessation of Phase B, the participants will receive evidence-based treatment for depression as per NIMHANS usual care protocols.
Sponsors
Deakin University
Study design
Allocation
Non-randomised trial
Intervention model
Single group
Primary purpose
Treatment
Masking
Open (masking not used)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
(i) 18 years or over, (ii) residing in Bengaluru, India, (iii) a current diagnosis of a Major Depressive Disorder as their primary presenting complaint, (iv) mobile smartphone with internet access, and (v) fluent in the English language, and (vi) assessed as able to receive outpatient care.
Exclusion criteria
i) psychotic disorder, bipolar disorder, neurodevelopmental disorder, neurodegenerative disorders, substance use disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorders, borderline personality disorder (ii) already receiving treatment for depression, with the exception of antidepressant medication commenced more than 4 weeks ago, and (iii) requires ongoing inpatient care for risk management that precludes transition to outpatient setting.
Outcome results
None listed