The common belief that suppressing negative thoughts is bad for your mental health may be all wrong. A new study finds researchers trained 120 volunteers worldwide to suppress their negative thoughts and fears and found not only did the thoughts become less vivid, but the participants' mental health also improved.
Professor Michael Anderson says for centuries avoidance has been considered a maladaptive coping mechanism, but he says, "This conflicts with a growing body of evidence from neuroscience and psychology that, in fact, people can and do this kind of thing all the time with some success". When COVID hit, Professor Anderson and a PhD student in his lab were concerned about the growing mental health crisis and wanted to try a different approach to help people cope with the depression, anxiety, and PTSD caused by the pandemic.
They asked adults in 16 countries to think of scenarios that might cause 20 fears and worries, 20 hopes and dreams, and 36 routine neutral events. Then, using a special technique, the researchers trained the participants to block images and thoughts of the negative events. "So, we were trying to get people to, say, sit down, confront this reminder, suppress the retrieval process, disrupt those representations. Now, if those thoughts don't keep popping to mind, they can't cause distress, and they won't cause distress."
After three days of training, the participants reported the events they practiced suppressing were much less vivid. "It basically reduced depression, it reduced anxiety, it reduced worry. It had all of the beneficial effects that we had anticipated based on the neuroscience evidence". And with no ill effects, according to Anderson.
Although participants were not asked to continue practicing the suppression technique, the majority chose to do so on their own, and after 3 months, reported the benefits—including less depression and anxiety, less rumination, and fewer negative emotions—had continued.
