The relationship between the rumination style and perceptual, cognitive, and behavioral inhibition.

Abstract

Rumination is defined as an emotion regulation strategy that consists of focusing on negative thoughts and feelings. It is important to identify the factors that make some people prone to this response style. The goal of this study is to analyze the differential contribution of the principal inhibitory processes on two forms of rumination: reflection and brooding. For this purpose, we relied on a sample of 27 adults from a non-clinical population. The researchers evaluated perceptual, cognitive and behavioral inhibition by means of computerized tasks and evaluation surveys on depression and rumination styles. The results provide evidence in support of the role of cognitive inhibition in both rumination styles and its greater contribution to maladaptive forms of rumination rather than to adaptive forms that are more oriented towards problem solving.