Modification of Attentional Bias to Emotional Faces Following Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy in People with a Current Depression
Mindfulness June 1, 2020 Paweł Holas, Izabela Krejtz, Katarzyna Wisiecka et al.
Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) reduces depression symptoms in people with current major depressive disorder and shifts how they attend to emotional facial expressions. After an 8-week MBCT program, participants' depression scores decreased, their attention to sad faces decreased, and their attention to happy faces increased compared to a wait-list control group. The results suggest that changes in attentional bias may cause clinical improvement, supporting the idea that MBCT works by modifying how depressed individuals process emotional information.