Clearing the mind: A working memory model of distraction from negative mood.

“Notably, the present research focused on the regulation of negative mood, because of its relevance to understanding mood disorders like chronic anxiety and depression (Nolen-Hoeksema, 2000) and because regulation of negative mood has received most attention in the emotion regulation literature (Gross, 1998).”

“As such, the concept of distraction plays an important role in leading theories of emotion regulation (Bishop, Duncan, & Lawrence, 2004; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Trask & Sigmon, 1999).”

“Indeed, many individuals engage in prolonged negative ruminations when they would prefer to entertain more pleasant thoughts (Koole, Smeets, van Knippenberg, & Dijksterhuis, 1999; Kuhl, 1994; Martin & Tesser, 1996).”

“The short survey served as a distraction to draw participants’ attention intentionally (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007) and prevented their working memory from keeping tweets of Phase 1 active.”

“They judged 30 moderately complex equations (adopted from Van Dillen & Koole, 2007), such as “19 + (3*7) = 40.””

“In doing so, distraction prevents premature emotional processing and 1 Reappraisal is an ER strategy that involves disengaging from an emotional stimulus by diverting one’s attention away from the emo - tional stimulus, to reduce the intensity of the emotional response (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Previous studies have shown that selective attention to negative affective stimuli is reduced when working memory load increases, such as achieved by performing a cognitively demanding task (Carter et al., 2003; Van Dillen & Derks, 2012; Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“For example, one study (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007) examined the effect of working memory demands of a distracting task in the attenuation of the negative emotions, and found that subjects reported less negative emotions after a complex problem (high working memory load, i.e. intense use of…”

“Loading of WM reduces emotional processing, e.g., distracting from negative moods (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Hashimoto et al. (2019) used a simple attention task to induce involuntary memories, and it is known that such monotonous tasks improve negative mood as distractions (McRae et al., 2010; Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Specifically, Van Dillen and Koole (2007) conducted an experiment where participants viewed unpleasant stimuli, followed by a working memory task, and were then asked to rate the intensity of their feelings.”

“In addition, anger can lead to scattered thinking and affect the efficiency of working memory (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“…high load condition because WM load may have led participants to overlook some of the emotional information and emotional circuits was attenuated with high processing load such as the amygdala (Mitchell et al 2007, Okon-Singer et al 2007, van Dillen and Koole 2007, 2009, van Dillen and Derks 2012).”

“…emotional responses and because research suggests that both cognitive tasks and emotional responses make use of the same limited resources, 11 the resources used to perform a cognitive task may no longer be available for emotional processes when an individual is stressed (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“…1 本研究の結果は，日本心理学会第 84回大会で発表された。 2 本研究は，科研費 18H05818の助成を受けた。 1 https://doi.org/10.4992/jjpsy.92.19037 し，気晴らしへの依存につながる可能性を示した。 思考抑制に関する研究では，この点に関する実証的 知見が得られている。特定の対象に関する思考抑制を 試みることは，その最中あるいは終了後に抑制対象と した思考の頻度を高める場合がある（Wenzlaff & Wegner, 2000）。思考抑制傾向，ストレス経験の高さは 3ヵ月後の反すう傾向の高さを予測することが示され…”

“Such strategies could involve thinking about something entirely different (Urry & Gross, 2010) or paying attention to a neutral activity or object (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“For example, participants are asked to redirect attention from negative emotions or thinking to some other nonnegative stimulus (e.g., thinking about travel plans, mental calculations, drawing positive contents; Phillips et al. 2008; Van Dillen and Koole 2007).”

“Distraction does not alter people’s goal-related perceptions but instead replaces the representation of the goal with unrelated cognitions (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007), thereby maybe even weakening goal commitment (Jostmann & Koole, 2009).”

“Disen-gagement distraction involves early diverting attention away from processing emotional information, by producing unrelated neutral thoughts (e.g. Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“It could be because neither loved nor hated names a ff ected the neutral trial because the high-demanding attentional blink task can attenuate the perception of an a ff ective state, especially a negative mood (Askim & Knardahl, 2021; Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Van Dillen and Koole (2007) showed that performing a working memory task may distract an individual from a negative mood, can reduce anger (Gerin et al. 2006; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema 1998), or even decrease symptoms of depression in depressed participants (Joormann and Siemer 2004; Morrow and…”

“Therefore, cognitive load, such as throwing oneself into a task at work or even performing difficult arithmetic has been suggested as a means of regulating emotion (Braunstein et al. 2017; Kanske et al. 2011; Van Dillen and Koole 2007).”

“From a cognitive perspective, humour requires attentional resources, and places demands on executive functioning, such as the ability to detect and resolve incongruities (Strick et al., 2009; Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Requiring additional attentional resources is expected to divert attention from affective stimulus processing (18, 19).”

“For example, Van Dillen and Koole (2007) demonstrated that introducing a high cognitive load following negative affect reduced the intensity of reported negative mood, suggesting that cognitive load can modulate emotional processing.”

“To illustrate this idea, Van Dillen and Koole (2007) used working memory theory to propose that engagement in a distracting activity imposes a working memory load, which in turn limits the resources available for maintaining the negative emotional state.”

“The notion that cognitive load in general facilitates anxiety reduction is based among others on the work of Van Dillen on mood regulation (e.g., Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”

“Since increased working memory load is shown to distract people from negative moods, people seeking to improve their mood should play digital games (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007)[52].”

“But while contempt aims at excluding the person from one’s social network (Fischer & Roseman, 2007), admiration, in contrast, is most likely to lead to a motivation to affiliate with the person (Van de Ven, Zeelenberg, & Pieters, 2011).”

“…et Desseilles (2012) Il existe différentes stratégies de régulation émotionnelle concrètes comme se concentrer sur une activité neutre (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007), le recadrage cognitif (Tugade, Frederickson, & Barrett, 2004), écrire sur ses émotions (Pennebaker & Chung, 2007), la…”

“Agreeableness is also associated with a positively-valence baseline of emotion, positive thinking and emotion regulation (Ng & Diener, 2009; Robinson, 2007; Tobin, Graziano, Vanman, & Tassinary, 2000).”

“…which increases the load on one’s working memory 71 through a distracting task in order to leave less room for feeling the negative emotion (Van Dillen and Koole, 2007); and (3) suppression of emotional response, which works by avoiding emotionexpressive behavior to keep one’s cool (Richards…”

“…Legrain, Damme, Eccleston, Daris, Seminowicz & Crombez, 2009) and high working memory load reduces negative affective responses to negative images (Schmeichel, Volokhov & Demaree, 2008; Van Dillen & Koole, 2007) and reduces attentional capture by pain (Legrain, Crombez, Verhoeven & Mouraux, 2011).”

“Tasks that involve a high demand on working memory (e.g., arithmetic problems) reduce negative emotion (Van Dillen & Koole, 2007).”