The effects of emotional content on source monitoring in fibromyalgia patients

Source confusion refers to a person's failure to distinguish whether an event has been actually seen or simply imagined. Nevertheless, prior research has demonstrated a reduction of source confusion for negative arousing information. According to the emotional-congruence effect, this emotional benefit is likely observed in patients suffering from chronic pain. This hypothesis was tested on 15 patients suffering of fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS) and 15 healthy women. In a source-monitoring task, participants had to decide whether positive, negative, and neutral words were imagined or seen with a picture. The results showed recognition deficits and more source confusion for FMS patients compared to controls. Contrary to the hypothesis of negativity bias in fibromyalgia, patients exhibited enhanced recognition for both positive and negative words. Moreover, they showed better source memory for the imagined items than for those seen with a picture. Overall, these results indicate that FMS affects episodic memory.