Emma Palmer-Cooper, Chloe Woods and Thomas Richardson

2023

BACKGROUND

Maladaptive cognitions can refer to thoughts and beliefs which are irrational/negative. Previous research has suggested an association with the severity of mood symptoms in bipolar (BD), which affects 2.4% of the global population.
This study, aimed to explore the association between maladaptive cognitions and mood symptoms in BD over 3 months. The study also investigated whether self-compassion intervened with these associations at any point.

METHODS

This study collected data via a questionnaire from 331 participants recruited online, which took approx. 40 minutes to complete. Three months later, 173 participants completed the questionnaire again. The questionnaire explored dysfunctional attitudes, maladaptive perfectionism, maladaptive thoughts, depressive symptoms, and mood states. Participants must have been over the age of 18, fluent in English and have a formal diagnosis of BD to be included.

RESULTS

70.4% of participants were female. A positive correlation was shown between dysfunctional attitudes, maladaptive perfectionism, metacognition, and symptoms of depression. Dysfunctional attitudes were also positively associated with mania. Self-compassion was negatively correlated with these factors but no clear relationship with mania. Mood states greatly differed in scores across factors.   
At the follow-up, maladaptive cognitions were associated with symptoms of depression, however, these factors did not significantly predict the presence of depressive symptoms.  
Individuals in a mixed or manic state had higher scores in maladaptive cognitions compared to depressed participants. Maladaptive cognitions were predictive of depression three months later.  

CONCLUSION

The study revealed that negative thought patterns were associated with depression; only dysfunctional attitudes showed an association with mania. This provides evidence for why addressing these thought patterns through therapy might help reduce depressive symptoms. 
Self-compassion was found to be negatively associated with all maladaptive thoughts and depression scores, while the relationship observed for mania was unclear.
When exploring current mood, negative thoughts were generally found to be significantly lower in participants. Low self-compassion mediated the relationship between all three maladaptive thought factors and depression; however, high self-compassion only mediated the relationship between dysfunctional attitudes and mania. More research about self-compassion and mania is needed, as compassion-based interventions might not be helpful during manic phases.

In the long term, only maladaptive thinking patterns about one’s thoughts were able to predict depression at the 3-month follow-up. Therefore, further exploration of metacognitive therapy for BD is recommended.

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