Health Service Center, Hiroshima University, Higashihiroshima, Japan.
Faculty of Humanities, Niigata University, Niigata, Japan.
Psychopathology. 2024;57(5):369-376. doi: 10.1159/000538266. Epub 2024 Apr 8.
Depression is highly prevalent among university students. While behavioral activation has been shown to be an effective psychotherapy for depression, there is a lack of research regarding the behavioral activation mechanism. Furthermore, although self-compassion seems to be a factor in promoting behavioral activation, no studies have attempted to validate a behavioral activation model that includes positive self-compassion. In addition, mechanistic studies have lacked consideration in longitudinal studies of behavioral activation. Thus, in this longitudinal study, we constructed and validated an exploratory model of behavioral activation.
A total of 300 undergraduate students completed online surveys in 2019, 2020, and 2021. We examined the longitudinal effects of five factors (value-based behavior, goal-oriented and scheduled activities, positive reinforcement, self-compassion, and depressive symptoms) using structural equation modeling based on maximum likelihood estimation using bootstrapping.
The exploratory model was found to be valid and to have a good fit with the data. The results indicate that value-based behaviors increase the frequency of goal-oriented and scheduled activities, which in turn increases the frequency of positive reinforcement in everyday life. Additionally, when self-compassion, value-based behavior, goal-oriented and scheduled activities, and positive reinforcement are considered together, self-compassion may be indirectly related to activation via value-based behavior.
From the perspective of preventing depressive symptoms, it is important to increase the frequency of value-based activities. Furthermore, adding self-compassion is effective in behavioral activation to increase value-based activities. However, to address the limitations of this study, future studies should investigate the relationship among behavioral characteristics during interventions.
抑郁症在大学生群体中较为普遍。行为激活已被证明是一种有效的治疗抑郁症的心理疗法,但对于行为激活的机制研究还比较缺乏。此外,虽然自我同情似乎是促进行为激活的一个因素,但没有研究试图验证包含积极自我同情的行为激活模型。此外,在行为激活的纵向研究中,机制研究缺乏考虑。因此,在这项纵向研究中,我们构建并验证了一个行为激活的探索性模型。
共有 300 名本科生在 2019 年、2020 年和 2021 年完成了在线调查。我们使用基于最大似然估计的结构方程模型(bootstrapping 法),考察了五个因素(基于价值的行为、目标导向和计划活动、积极强化、自我同情和抑郁症状)的纵向影响。
探索性模型被证明是有效的,并且与数据拟合良好。结果表明,基于价值的行为增加了目标导向和计划活动的频率,进而增加了日常生活中的积极强化频率。此外,当自我同情、基于价值的行为、目标导向和计划活动以及积极强化一起考虑时,自我同情可能通过基于价值的行为间接与激活相关。
从预防抑郁症状的角度来看,增加基于价值的活动的频率很重要。此外,在行为激活中增加自我同情可以有效增加基于价值的活动。然而,为了克服本研究的局限性,未来的研究应该调查干预期间行为特征之间的关系。