We can imagine looking at ourselves (observer perspective) or through our own eyes (field perspective). Cognitive and clinical theories suggest that compared to field perspective, observer perspective imagery reduces emotional intensity, for example, of trauma memories. Tests of causality are lacking and less is known about perspective and positive emotion. Using contrasting experimental manipulations, participants imagined 100 positive descriptions from either (1) a field perspective or (2) an observer perspective, or (3) thought about their verbal meaning. Affect was more positive after field than observer imagery and verbal conditions, with mood deterioration within the latter two. Findings are the first to demonstrate causality of imagery perspective on emotion. Further, the results demonstrate that imagining positive events from one's own perspective is critical to improving positive affect. Treatment implications include promoting field imagery to facilitate a more rose-tinted view of positive events.

BackgroundChildren with chronic physical illness are significantly more likely to develop common psychiatric symptoms than otherwise healthy children. These children therefore warrant effective integrated healthcare yet it is not established whether the known, effective, psychological treatments for symptoms of common childhood mental health disorders work in children with chronic physical illness.MethodsEMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO and CINAHL databases were searched with predefined terms relating to evidence-based psychological interventions for psychiatric symptoms in children with chronic physical illness. We included all studies (randomised and non-randomised designs) investigating interventions aimed primarily at treating common psychiatric symptoms in children with a chronic physical illness in the review. Two reviewers independently assessed the relevance of abstracts identified, extracted data and undertook quality analysis.ResultsTen studies (209 children, including 70 in control groups) met the criteria for inclusion in the review. All studies demonstrated some positive outcomes of cognitive behavioural therapy for the treatment of psychiatric symptoms in children with chronic physical illness. Only two randomised controlled trials, both investigating interventions for symptoms of depression, were found.ConclusionsThere is preliminary evidence that cognitive behavioural therapy has positive effects in the treatment of symptoms of depression and anxiety in children with chronic physical illness. However, the current evidence base is weak and fully powered randomised controlled trials are needed to establish the efficacy of psychological treatments in this vulnerable population.

Experimental evidence using picture–word cues has shown that generating mental imagery has a causal impact on emotion, at least for images prompted by negative or benign stimuli. It remains unclear whether this finding extends to overtly positive stimuli and whether generating positive imagery can increase positive affect in people with dysphoria. Dysphoric participants were assigned to one of three conditions, and given instructions to generate mental images in response to picture–word cues which were either positive, negative or mixed (control) in valence. Results showed that the positive picture–word condition increased positive affect more than the control and negative conditions. Participants in the positive condition also demonstrated enhanced performance on a behavioural task compared to the two other conditions. Compared to participants in the negative condition, participants in the positive condition provided more positive responses on a homophone task administered after 24 h to assess the durability of effects. These findings suggest that a positive picture–word task used to evoke mental imagery leads to improvements in positive mood, with transfer to later performance. Understanding the mechanisms underlying mood change in dysphoria may hold implications for both theory and treatment development.

Mental health problems are common in children and adolescents, yet evidence‐based treatments are hard to access. Self‐help interventions can increase such access. The aim of this paper was to conduct a systematic review and meta‐analysis of the use of guided and unguided self‐help for children and young people with symptoms of common mental health disorders. In contrast to previous reviews of self‐help in children, all types of self‐help and multiple mental health disorders were investigated in order to increase power to investigate potential moderators of efficacy. Importantly, studies with control arms as well as those comparing against traditional face‐to‐face treatments were included. Fifty studies (n = 3396 participants in self‐help/guided self‐help conditions) met the inclusion criteria. Results demonstrated a moderate positive effect size for guided and unguided self‐help interventions when compared against a control group (n = 44; g = 0.49; 95% CI: 0.37 to 0.61, p < .01) and a small but significant negative effect size when compared to other therapies (n = 15; g = −0.17; 95% CI: –0.27 to –0.07, p < .01). Few potential moderators had a significant effect on outcome. Most comparisons resulted in significant heterogeneity and therefore results are interpreted with caution.