Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour
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Thesis defense Patricia van Deurzen (Donders Series 119)

June 11, 2013

Promotors: Prof.dr. J.K. Buitelaar, Prof.dr. A.E.M. Speckens

Copromotor: Dr. D.I.E. Slaats-Willemse

Information processing and depressive symptoms in healthy adolescents

This thesis examined (mood-congruent) information processing and non-clinical depressive symptoms in three samples of young adolescents and university students, both in cross-sectional and longitudinal study designs.

The findings of this thesis show that:

  1. attentional disengagement from negative information and depressive symptoms, rumination and distraction are not consistently related
  2. attentional disengagement from negative information and the cue validity effect of negative information show instability over different task-conditions and show no test-retest stability over one year
  3. the coping strategy distraction is related to enhanced cognitive inhibition of sad faces (negative affective priming), primarily in the absence of depressive symptoms
  4. depressive symptoms and rumination are not related to cognitive inhibition of sad faces (negative affective priming)
  5. cognitive inhibition of sad faces shows no test-retest stability over one year
  6. compared to same-gender controls, girls with depressive symptoms and primarily anhedonic symptoms show better memory for task-irrelevant stimuli
  7. compared to same-gender controls, boys with depressive symptoms and primarily restlessness and self-criticism show faster but more erroneous responses on a sustained attention task
  8. in young adolescent girls but not in boys, affective problems are associated with slower baseline speed, enhanced response time variability, deficient response inhibition and poorer working memory
  9. in young adolescent girls but not in boys, enhanced response time variability predicts affective problems 2.5 and 5 years later and deficient response inhibition predicts affective problems 5 years later

The findings of this thesis suggest that attentional disengagement from negative information and negative affective priming may not be cognitive key mechanisms in the causal framework of depressive symptoms in healthy adolescents, and that neurocognitive vulnerability plays a role in the gender-specific developmental trajectory of depression.