Linguistic analysis of the autobiographical memories of individuals with major depressive disorder.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is characterized by biases in memory, attention, and cognition. The present study utilized the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) to examine the content of specific autobiographical memories (AMs) recalled by individuals with MDD during an autobiographical memory task.

Methods

We examined various features of the text (including use of affective, cognitive, and self-referential terms), as well as their associations with clinical and cognitive features of MDD (depression severity, autobiographical memory specificity, amygdala activity), in 45 unmedicated adults with MDD compared to 61 healthy controls.

Results

When recalling positive memories MDD individuals used the word "I" less, fewer positive words, more words indicat

SUBMITTER: Himmelstein P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6258120 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature