Biased memories contribute to the links between stress and depressive symptoms

Perceived stress undermines emotional wellbeing, and poorer emotional wellbeing may intensify perceived stress. The current studies examined whether biased memories contribute to the possible reciprocal links between perceived stress and depressive symptoms. Two longitudinal studies compared the stress people perceived for several weeks (Study 1, N = 308) or during a conflict interaction (Study 2, N = 261) with memories of perceived stress gathered in subsequent weeks. People with low depressive symptoms remembered their past as involving less perceived stress than they initially experienced (positive bias). By contrast, people with average or higher levels of depressive symptoms remembered their past as involving exactly as much perceived stress as initially experienced (depressive realism) or, at very high levels of depressive symptoms, more perceived stress than initially experienced (negative bias). These memory biases had important implications. Accounting for initial levels of perceived stress, more negative memories of perceived stress predicted greater weekly depressed mood (Study 1) and greater depressive symptoms across time (Study 2). Evaluating whether life has involved as much perceived stress as now remembered may help facilitate emotional wellbeing in the face of rising perceived stress and depressive symptoms. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).