Cognitive reactivity amplifies the activation and development of negative self-schema: A revised mnemic neglect paradigm and computational modelling

Little is known about how self-schemas are formed, fluctuate, and are reinforced. In this study, we used a revised mnemic neglect paradigm to examine how self-schema fluctuates following episodic events (feedback) and its self-concordance. Undergraduate students (N = 42) exhibiting various depressive symptoms underwent psychological testing followed by bogus feedback regarding their personality, future, and behavioural traits, where they rated their state self-schemas and feedback self-concordance trial by trial. Linear mixed models showed that feedback self-concordance was determined by the interaction between self-schema and the emotional valence of the feedback, and the self-schema fluctuated with the interaction between prediction error (the difference between the emotional valence of the feedback and the current self-schema) and feedback self-concordance. Cognitive reactivity, the ease of responding to negative moods, was associated with higher parameters regressed onto self-schema and self-concordance regardless of feedback valence, indicating that it enhances the likelihood of self-schema fluctuation positively and negatively. The results of computational modelling employed for the simulation of self-schema development show that some individuals developed a negative self-schema even after experiencing many positive events, while others developed a positive self-schema after experiencing many negative events; these parameters were characteristic of individuals with high levels of cognitive reactivity. These results have significant implications for self-schema development and depression.