Biased Maintenance of Attention on Sad Faces in Clinically Depressed Youth: An Eye-Tracking Study

C. Buhl*, A. Sfärlea, J. Loechner, K. Starman-Wöhrle, E. Salemink, G. Schulte-Körne, B. Platt

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

The role of negative attention biases (AB), central to cognitive models of adult depression, is yet unclear in youth depression. We investigated negative AB in depressed compared to healthy youth and tested whether AB are more pronounced in depressed than at-risk youth. Negative AB was assessed for sad and angry faces with an eye-tracking paradigm [Passive Viewing Task (PVT)] and a behavioural task [Visual Search Task (VST)], comparing three groups of 9–14-year-olds: youth with major depression (MD; n = 32), youth with depressed parents (high-risk; HR; n = 49) and youth with healthy parents (low-risk; LR; n = 42). The PVT revealed MD participants to maintain attention longer on sad faces compared to HR, but not LR participants. This AB correlated positively with depressive symptoms. The VST revealed no group differences. Our results provide preliminary evidence for a negative AB in maintenance of attention on disorder-specific emotional information in depressed compared to at-risk youth.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)189–201
Number of pages13
JournalChild Psychiatry and Human Development
Volume54
Issue number1
Early online date2 Sept 2021
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Feb 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. This study was funded by "Förderprogramm für Forschung und Lehre" (FöFoLe, grant number 895) of the Medical Faculty of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and the Hans und Klementia Langmatz Stiftung.

Funding Information:
We would like to thank all participants for their support! Furthermore, we thank Petra Wagenbüchler, Sonja Stolp and team for their help with participant recruitment and Petra Wagenbüchler, Veronika Jäger, Lisa Ordenewitz, Jakob Neumüller, Laura Asperud Thomsen, Moritz Dannert and Ann-Sophie Störmann for their help with data collection.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).

Funding

Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. This study was funded by "Förderprogramm für Forschung und Lehre" (FöFoLe, grant number 895) of the Medical Faculty of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and the Hans und Klementia Langmatz Stiftung.

FundersFunder number
Hans und Klementia Langmatz Stiftung
Medical Faculty of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich
Petra Wagenbüchler
Sonja Stolp

    Keywords

    • Attention bias
    • Eye-tracking
    • Risk for depression
    • Youth depression

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