Autobiographical Memory and Future Thinking Specificity and Content in Chronic Pain

Abstract

Chronic pain is associated with high levels of mental health issues and alterations in cognitive processing. Cognitive-behavioral models illustrate the role of memory alterations (e.g., autobiographical memory and future thinking) in the development and maintenance of chronic pain as well as in mental health disorders which frequently co-occur with chronic pain (e.g., anxiety and mood disorders). This study aims to expand our understanding of specific cognitive mechanisms underlying chronic pain which may in turn shed light on cognitive processes underlying pain-related psychological distress. Individuals (N = 84) who reported a history of chronic pain and individuals who reported no history of chronic pain (N = 102) were recruited from MTurk to complete an online survey including standardized measures of anxiety and depression and two sentence completion tasks that assessed autobiographical memory and future thinking specificity and content. Chi square analyses revealed that participants who endorsed experiencing chronic pain were significantly more likely to recall at least one painful and negative event and to imagine at least one anticipated painful event in their future. Two ANCOVAs were performed to examine the degree to which chronic pain endorsement influenced specificity in memory and future imagining. Individuals with a history of chronic pain and higher levels of depression symptom severity generated autobiographical memories with significantly less specificity; whereas, individuals with a history of chronic pain also generated future autobiographical events with significantly less specificity. In addition, individuals with a history of chronic pain were more likely to generate episodes related to pain when asked to recall the past or imagine the future. Further research is needed to improve our understanding of the etiology of autobiographical memory and future thinking specificity and content in the pathogenesis of mental health conditions in the context of chronic pain.

Painful reminders: Involvement of the autobiographical memory system in pediatric postsurgical pain and the transition to chronicity

“…Quenstedt et al 95 used an online version of the Sentence Completion for Events from the Past Test 109 and a future-oriented equivalent 110 to assess specificity in memories and future imagination, respectively, in patients with chronic pain. Eighty-four participants with self-reported chronic pain and 102 self-identified healthy controls generated specific memories and plausible personal future events in response to neutral sentence stems.…”

“…Cross-sectional studies on autobiographical memory in adults have found that individuals with various chronic pain conditions tend to recall more pain-related content 95 , 138 and exhibit a bias in which they recall memories with more negative emotional valence. 96, 140 ,141 In regard to valence, it has been suggested by some that it is current pain, not chronic pain per se, that contributes to negative emotionality.…”

“… 100 Recent findings that people with chronic pain tend to generate pain-related information when remembering the past and imagining the future further indicate that these biases might extend beyond memory and have important implications for well-being. 95 …”

Autobiographical memory predicts postsurgical pain up to 12 months after major surgery

“…Cross-sectional research on the topic yields mixed findings. Some studies have found greater overgenerality 30 , 52 , 71 and differences in retrieval latency among individuals with chronic pain compared with pain-free controls. 30 , 77 Quenstedt et al 52 extended these findings by showing that individuals with a history of chronic pain have similar patterns of reduced specificity as well as more pain-related content in their recollections and imagined future episodes.…”

“…Some studies have found greater overgenerality 30 , 52 , 71 and differences in retrieval latency among individuals with chronic pain compared with pain-free controls. 30 , 77 Quenstedt et al 52 extended these findings by showing that individuals with a history of chronic pain have similar patterns of reduced specificity as well as more pain-related content in their recollections and imagined future episodes. These observations align with findings that individuals with chronic pain tend to retrieve memories with congruent emotionality and content.…”