Study On The Relationship Between The Future Thinking And Self In Depressive People

Previous studies found that hopelessness was very common among depressed patients. The patients exhibited negative view of the future, with increased negative expectancy of future and decreased positive expectancy of future. Meanwhile, studies concerning healthy participants found that individuals’ future thinking is associated with the self. Therefore, it is possible that the deficit of future expectancy in depression may be influenced by the factor of self. We hypothesized that the depressive group showed increase negative expectancy and decreased positive expectancy of future only for events related to personal goals, but not for the common events not associated with personal goal. Conducting two experiments with different paradigms, the present study aimed to testify this assumption. There were two groups of participants in the study: depressive group(whose total scores on the Beck Depression Inventory(BDI) were equal to or above 14) and normal control group(whose BDI scores were not more than 4). Expt. 1 adopted the future thinking task(FTT). The subjects were asked to generate as many future events as possible in one minute of the following four types respectively: personal goal related positive events, personal goal related negative events, nonpersonal goal related positive events, nonpersonal goal related negative events. The results showed that, compared to the control group, the depressive group reported fewer anticipated personal goal related future positive events. There were no significant differences in the personal negative events, the nonpersonal positive and negative events. Expt. 2 used the likelihood estimation measure(LEM) paradigm. Firstly, an interview was conducted to get 10 personal goals for each subject. Then 20 positive and 20 negative future events associated with these personal goals were produced, as well as 20 positive and 20 negative events not related with the personal goals. The subjects were required to judge the likelihood that each of the given events happens to them in the future. The results showed that, compared to the control group, the depressive group regarded the personal future negative events as more likely to occur on themselves and the personal future positive events as less likely to occur on themselves, there was significant difference regarding the nonpersonal negative future events but no significant difference in terms of nonpersonal positive future events. These findings verified our expectations partially, demonstrating that the lack of positive expectancy in depressed people was modulated by the factor of self. However, the increased negative expectancy of future is seemed to be a common trait in depressed people regardless of the self.