Major Depressive Disorder
Conditions
Keywords
Memory Flexibility
Brief summary
Our collection of memories for personal experiences plays an important role in shaping our sense of who we are as people. These memories, termed autobiographical memories, can also be helpful in social situations, for sharing the details of our experiences with other people, reminiscing about pleasant times and solving problems by remembering what has and hasn't worked in the past. Different types of autobiographical memory are helpful to us depending on the particular situation the investigators are in at the time. Recent research has shown that experiencing depressed mood can affect how we relate to our autobiographical memories, so that instead of providing a rich source of personal information in a helpful and flexible way, the types of memories that come to mind are more narrowly focused on difficult or negative experiences. This can cause low mood to persist over time. The purpose of this study is to test a newly-developed therapeutic training package for depressed mood (MemFlex), designed to encourage helpful and flexible ways of relating to autobiographical memories. The MemFlex programme consists of a one-to-one orientation session with the researcher to introduce the training package, followed by a workbook that is completed at home.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALMemory Flexibility Training
As in experimental arm description.
BEHAVIORALPsychoeducation
As in experimental arm description.
Sponsors
Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
SINGLE (Outcomes Assessor)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* Currently experiencing Major Depressive Episode, indexed on the Structured Clinical Interview for the DSM-IV (SCID; First et al., 1996). * Score of 13 or above on the Beck Depression Inventory (Beck et al., 1996)
Exclusion criteria
* SCID assessment indicates they are experiencing another mood disorder, psychosis, current alcohol or substance dependence/abuse. * Diagnosed Axis II disorder or brain injury (assessed by participant report)
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Depressive Status | Three months after completion of the workbook | — |
| Change in score on the Beck Depression Inventory (Beck, Steer, & Brown, 1996) from baseline | Three months after completion of the workbook | Self report measure of depression symptoms |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Depression free days | Three months after completion of the workbook | Number of depression free days from post to follow-up. |
| Change in memory flexibility from baseline, Score on the alternating instructions autobiographical memory task (Dritschel et al., 2013) | Three months after completion of the workbook | Score on the alternating instructions autobiographical memory task (Dritschel et al., 2013) |
Other
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Change in Hopelessness, as measured by Beck Hopelessness Scale | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Beck Hopelessness Scale |
| Change in Rumination as measured by Rumination Response Scale | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Rumination Response Scale (Treynor, Gonzalez, Nolen-Hoeksema, 2003); |
| Change in Problem solving, as measured by the Means-Ends Problem Solving task | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Means-Ends Problem Solving task (Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2003) |
| Change in Cognitive Avoidance, as measured by Cognitive Avoidance Questionnaire | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Cognitive Avoidance Questionnaire (Sexton & Dugas, 2008) |
| Change in Verbal Fluency as measured by the Verbal Fluency Task | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Verbal Fluency Task |
| Change in Anxiety symptoms, as measured by the Beck Anxiety Inventory | 4-6 weeks after beginning the workbook | Beck Anxiety Inventory |
Countries
United Kingdom
Outcome results
None listed