they called a negative cognitive style. Individuals who possess a negative
cognitive style tend to attribute their problems to stable (enduring) and global
(widespread) causes. They also tend to anticipate the most dreadful conse-
quences and often believe the problem is the result of or reflects their own per-
sonal shortcomings. Investigators have developed procedures to measure the
extent to which people rely on this type of thinking (Alloy et al., 2000; Beevers,
Strong, Meyer, Pilkonis, & Miller, 2007; Peterson et al., 1982; Peterson &
Villanova, 1988). Like other personality variables, negative cognitive styletends to be fairly stable over time (Burns & Seligman, 1989; Hankin, 2008).
Not surprisingly, researchers find that negative cognitive style is related to
depression (Goldberg, Gerstein, Wenze, Beck & Welker, 2008; Haeffel et al.,2003; Hankin, Fraley, & Abela, 2005; Lau & Eley, 2008; Otto et al., 2007;
Riso et al., 2003). People who interpret negative events as the result of personal
shortcomings that are enduring and widespread are vulnerable to depressionwhen one of life ’s unfortunate experiences inevitably comes their way. One
pair of investigators looked at the psychological effects of physical and emo-
tional abuse in a group of battered women (Palker-Corell & Marcus, 2004).The researchers contacted the women within 2 weeks after their arrival at a
battered women ’s shelter. They found the women with a negative cognitive
style suffered from depression and other symptoms of trauma more often than
the women who did not rely on this style of thinking. Another study looked at
emotional reactions following a strong earthquake (Greening, Stoppelbein, &
Docter, 2002). Participants with a negative cognitive style were more likely to
be depressed after the earthquake than those without this cognitive style.
Investigators also use negative cognitive style to predict who might be vul-
nerable to future episodes of depression (Evans, Heron, Lewis, Araya, &Wolke, 2005; Fresco, Alloy, & Reilly-Harrington, 2006; Lewinsohn et al.,
2001; Robinson & Alloy, 2003). One team of researchers measured negative
cognitive style in incoming college freshmen (Alloy, Abramson, Whitehouse,Hogan, Panzarella, & Rose, 2006). They divided the students into those who
had previously suffered from an episode of depression and those who had
not. The researchers contacted the students again every 6 weeks for the next2 1/2 years. As shown in Figure 16.8, the students who were identified as high
risk for depression based on their negative cognitive style were much more
likely to experience at least one episode of major depression during this timethan the other students. This was not only the case for those who had bouts
of depression prior to college, but also for those who had never before suffered
from depression. In fact, the high-risk students in the latter group were 6 timesmore likely to experience depression than their low-risk classmates.
We should also note that the link between cognitive style and depression
may be affected by culture. Recall from earlier chapters that people in collec-tivist cultures tend to emphasize their role in the community, whereas people
in individualistic cultures focus on their individual aspirations and accomplish-
ments. One team of researchers found that college students in China (a collec-tivist culture) had a more pessimistic cognitive style than American students
(Lee & Seligman, 1997). Consistent with their individualistic emphasis, the
Americans were more likely to attribute successes to their own efforts and450 CHAPTER 16 The Cognitive Approach