Neural Responses to Reward and Pleasant Pictures Prospectively Predict Remission From Depression

Reduced neural responses to reward and pleasant stimuli-indicators of anhedonia and reduced emotional reactivity, respectively-have been reported among individuals with depressive disorders. The current study examined whether these neural measures could prospectively predict the course of depression among a community-based sample of 83 participants diagnosed with a depressive disorder. At initial assessment, participants performed both a guessing task to elicit the reward positivity (RewP) and a picture viewing paradigm with neutral and pleasant pictures to measure the late positive potential (LPP)-both event-related brain potentials (ERPs) independently related to diagnosis of depression. After approximately 9 months, 53 of those participants returned to the lab for a clinical assessment of current symptoms and course of disorder during the follow-up period. We found a more intact (i.e., larger) RewP and LPP at baseline among participants who achieved an episode of full remission from depression at any point during the follow-up period. In multiple logistic regression models, the RewP and LPP were both independent predictors of remission status; moreover, the RewP, but not the LPP, remained a significant predictor after accounting for other clinical variables that predicted remission. These data provide initial evidence for the clinical utility of ERPs from reward and picture viewing tasks within depressed individuals to predict disease course prospectively, which could be further leveraged to improve intervention approaches and parse the heterogeneity of depression.

Automated summary

The study found that in a group of individuals with depression, those with more intact neural measures (RewP and LPP) at diagnosis were more likely to achieve full remission from depression during the follow-up period. These neural measures were identified as independent predictors of disease course.