EMOTION-RELATED INFORMATION PROCESSING BIASES ASSOCIATED WITH DEPRESSION IN CHILDHOOD

Few studies have examined depression in children from an Information Processing (IP) perspective. In this thesis a number of domains of IP (known to be associated with adult depression) are examined in children and adolescents, in particular, autobiographical memory specificity in both clinical and non-clinical samples. Foremost, overgeneral memory (OGM) was found for the first time, to be characteristic of dysphoric (Study 1) and clinically depressed children (Study 2). Similarity in the extent of the OGM bias in depressed and dysphoric children was observed. OGM was also comparable across child, adolescent and adult depressed groups (Study 2). Second, OGM predicted depressive symptoms in children during a stressful life event, in the first longitudinal diathesis-stress investigation of OGM to date (Study 3). OGM was also linked for the first time to an overgeneral thinking style and to a depressive attributional style (Study 3) thereby offering possible mechanistic insight in OGM. Third, in support of Williams ' (1996) developmental origins hypothesis, OGM was also demonstrated in children in residential care who had suffered significant independently verified negative life events (Study 5). OGM in these youth was positively correlated wit