Rumination: Deductions on Inductions

Rumination is a well established cognitive vulnerability to depressed mood. Research exploring the causal relationship between rumination and depressed mood has used an induction method limited by its design and the definition it is based on. The current project developed new rumination inductions and compared these with mood inductions (positive, negative and neutral) and the traditional rumination and distraction inductions. The three novel inductions were based on the mood inductions, but presented three phrases repeatedly instead of 24 sequential statements, mimicking the repetitive, recurrent nature of ruminative thought. Three hundred and eighty four student participants were randomly assigned to the 8 induction conditions. They then completed a mood measure and two cognitive tests assessing attention and inhibition. Results showed the two negative inductions and the two positive inductions produced poorer performance on the inhibition task, suggesting that mood may be more involved in impairments of inhibition than cognitive processes. There was also a significant difference in attention between the two neutral tasks suggesting that simply watching repeated phrases, as opposed to sequential phrases may impair attention. Implications for clinical practice are discussed.