A discrete emotions approach to positive emotion disturbance in depression

Abstract

Converging findings suggest that depressed individuals exhibit disturbances in positive emotion. No study, however, has ascertained which specific positive emotions are implicated in depression. We report two studies that compare how depressive symptoms relate to distinct positive emotions at both trait and state levels of assessment. In Study 1 (N=185), we examined associations between depressive symptoms and three trait positive emotions (pride, happy, amusement). Study 2 compared experiential and autonomic reactivity to pride, happy, and amusement film stimuli between depressive (n=24; DS) and non-depressive (n=31; NDS) symptom groups. Results indicate that symptoms of depression were most strongly associated with decreased trait pride and decreased positive emotion experience to pride-eliciting films. Discussion focuses on the implications these findings have for understanding emotion deficits in depression as well as for the general study of positive emotion.

Keywords:

• Depression
• Positive emotion
• Pride

Acknowledgements

We thank Ilmo van der Löwe, Lauren Shapiro, Mike Polignano, Jeffrey Newell, Murph Lynch, and Adam Cohen for their assistance in data collection and analysis, Jonathan Rottenberg for insightful comments regarding data analysis, and Rudy Mendoza-Denton for helpful comments on writing.

Notes

¹The DPES scale contains several other scales to measure distinct positive emotions, including compassion, awe, contentment, and love. We did not include them in the present study for two reasons. First, there was not a sufficient literature base upon which to generate a priori hypotheses beyond the three target emotions. We focused on only those scales for which we had a priori hypotheses so as to decrease the likelihood of a Type I error. Second, we wanted the DPES trait emotions to parallel the three state positive emotions elicited by our films in Study 2.

²Although we coded facial expressions of sadness, fear, anger, happiness, and amusement using previously published standards (Gruber et al., 2008), the base rate of facial expressions was too low to meaningfully analyse group differences in the present study.

³Baseline differences in emotional responses during the neutral film between DS and NDS participants were examined using a series of univariate ANOVAs. The DS group reported greater anxiety (M=2.37, SD=0.99) relative to the NDS group (M=1.74, SD=0.84), p<.01. Furthermore, consistent with prior research (see Rottenberg et al., 2007, for a review), the DS group (M=5.96, SD=0.97) exhibited lower baseline RSA levels compared to the NDS group (M=6.42, SD=0.92). There were no differences for the other emotion variables (ps>.05).

⁴We took special care to examine the skewness and kurtosis indices of our variables across Studies 1 and 2. Log transformations were performed to normalise the distribution for variables as needed. Substituting these variables in analyses did not substantially change the pattern of results.