Ambiguity Processing Bias Induced by Depressed Mood Is Associated with Diminished Pleasantness

Depressed individuals are biased to perceive, interpret, and judge ambiguous cues in a negative/pessimistic manner. Depressed mood can induce and exacerbate these biases, but the underlying mechanisms are not fully understood. We theorize that depressed mood can bias ambiguity processing by altering one’s subjective emotional feelings (e.g. pleasantness/unpleasantness) of the cues. This is because when there is limited objective information, individuals often rely on subjective feelings as a source of information for cognitive processing. To test this theory, three groups (induced depression vs. spontaneous depression vs. neutral) were tested in the Judgement Bias Task (JBT), a behavioral assay of ambiguity processing bias. Subjective pleasantness/unpleasantness of cues was measured by facial electromyography (EMG) from the zygomaticus major (ZM, “smiling”) and from the corrugator supercilii (CS, “frowning”) muscles. As predicted, induced sad mood (vs. neutral mood) yielded a negative bias with a magnitude comparable to that in a spontaneous depressed mood. The facial EMG data indicates that the negative judgement bias induced by depressed mood was associated with a decrease in ZM reactivity (i.e., diminished perceived pleasantness of cues). Our results suggest that depressed mood may bias ambiguity processing by affecting the reward system.