Self-generated thoughts and depression: from daydreaming to depressive symptoms

Abstract

Human minds often engage in thoughts and feelings that are self-generated rather than stimulus-dependent, such as daydreaming. Recent research suggests that under certain circumstances, daydreaming is associated with adverse effects on cognition and affect. Based on recent literature about the influence of resting mind in relation to rumination and depression, this questionnaire study investigated mechanisms linking daydreaming to depressive symptoms. Specifically, an indirect effect model was tested in which daydreaming influences depressive symptoms through enhancing self-focus and ruminative thought. Results were in line with the hypothesis and several alternative pathways were ruled out. The results provide initial supportive evidence that daydreaming can influence depressive symptoms through influences on self-focus and rumination. Further research should use prospective or experimental designs to further validate and strengthen these conclusions.

Spontaneous Thought and Goal Pursuit: From Functions such as Planning to Dysfunctions such as Rumination

“…In that sense, rumination is a specific subtype of spontaneous thought characterized by dominant negative thought content that is processed in an abstract and repetitive way so as to lock the train of thoughts into a thematically narrow content channel (Klinger, 2013;Watkins, 2008). Here it is important to note that this differs from many other instances in which spontaneous thought unfolds in an open, expansive, and divergent way (Marchetti et al, 2014;Watkins, 2010). …”

“…Given the relevance of goals and mental habits in spontaneous thoughts, one might suspect a rather large overlap between ruminative thinking and daydreaming. However, correlational studies clearly report only moderate correlations Marchetti, Van de Putte, & Koster, 2014). One explanation for this is that the term daydreaming is often used to refer specifically to fanciful mental streams, whereas rumination is generally serious and uncreative.…”

Love is the triumph of the imagination: Daydreams about significant others are associated with increased happiness, love and connection

“…For example, there is evidence to suggest that daydreaming may be detrimental to well-being due to its associations with dysphoria (Smallwood, O'Connor, Sudbery, & Obonsawin, 2007), depression (Carriere, Cheyne, & Smilek, 2008;Giambra & Traynor, 1978), rumination and self-focused attention (Marchetti, Van de Putte, & Koster, 2014) and feeling less happy in daily life (Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010). However, research increasingly acknowledges that daydreaming is unlikely to be a homogenous experience and has begun to explore the conditions under which daydreaming is associated with negative and positive emotion.…”

Validation of the Chinese version of the Mind-Wandering Questionnaire (MWQ) and the mediating role of self-esteem in the relationship between mind-wandering and life satisfaction for adolescents

“…For example, a large-scale study using the experience sampling method revealed that people tended to be unhappier in their daily lives when their minds were wandering compared to when they were not; a follow-up timelag analysis found that mind-wandering was an antecedent of negative mood (Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010). Moreover, evidence from clinically depressed and dysphoric samples also found a high frequency of mind-wandering was associated with depressed symptoms (Marchetti et al, 2014;Smallwood et al, 2007). However, another experimental study induced the positive and negative emotions in the laboratory and found negative emotions resulted in a higher frequency of mindwandering relative to positive emotions (Smallwood, Fitzgerald, Miles, Personality andIndividual Differences 92 (2016) 118-122 &Phillips, 2009).…”

“…Self-esteem, a global feeling of self-value or adequacy as a person (Rosenberg, 1965), might act as an important role in this relationship. One of the defining features of mindwandering is intrinsic spontaneous cognition (Smallwood & Schooler, 2015), which has been associated with increased attention on one's inner thoughts, emotions, and experience (Marchetti et al, 2012(Marchetti et al, , 2014. Increased mind-wandering may lead to the excessive self-attention (Mor & Winquist, 2002), which may increase the risk of self-evaluation and can be related to negative emotion.…”