The Functional Design of Depression's Influence on Attention: A Preliminary Test of Alternative Control-Process Mechanisms

Substantial evidence indicates that depression focuses attention on the problems that caused the episode, so much that it interferes with the ability to focus on other things. We hypothesized that depression evolved as a response to important, complex problems that could only be solved, if they could be solved at all, with an attentional state that was highly focused for sustained periods. Under this hypothesis, depression promotes analysis and …