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Mild Depression in Low Back Pain: the Interaction of Thought Suppression and Stress Plays a Role, Especially in Female Patients

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A Correction to this article was published on 26 December 2017

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Abstract

Purpose

Mild depression has been shown as a precursor and as a consequence of low back pain, even in early phases of acute or subacute pain. Chronic daily life stress as well as dysfunctional pain-related cognitions such as thought suppression (TS) seem to play a role in the pain-depression cycle; however, the mechanisms of these associations are less understood. Experimentally induced TS, conceived as the attempt to directly suppress sensations such as pain, has been shown to paradoxically cause a delayed and non-volitional return of the suppressed thoughts and sensations and to increase affective distress. These dysfunctional processes are supposed to increase under high cognitive load, such as high stress.

Method

In the present cross-sectional study, we for the first time sought to examine a possible interaction between habitual TS and stress on depression in N = 177 patients with subacute low back pain (SLBP), using the following questionnaires: Subscale Thought Suppression from Avoidance-Endurance Questionnaire, Beck Depression Inventory, and Kiel Interview of Subjective Situation. A three-way ANOVA was conducted with two groups of TS (high/low), stress (high/low) and sex as independent factors and depression as dependent.

Results

Results indicated a significant three-way interaction with highest depression scores in female patients showing high TS and high stress. Overall main effects for sex and stress indicated higher depression in women and in highly stressed patients.

Conclusion

Our findings support the hypothesis that TS heightens depressive mood under conditions of high cognitive load especially in female patients with SLBP indicating a special vulnerability for depressive mood in women with SLBP.

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Change history

  • 26 December 2017

    This article was updated to correct the author names. Family and given names are in the correct order.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by a research grant from the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft: HA 1684) awarded to MIH. We further thank Nina Kreddig for providing helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medical Psychology and Medical Sociology, Faculty of Medicine, Ruhr-University of Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801, Bochum, Germany

    Kerstin Konietzny, Omar Chehadi & Monika Ilona Hasenbring

  2. Department of General Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany

    Irmgard Streitlein-Böhme

  3. Department of General Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Ruhr-University of Bochum, Bochum, Germany

    Herbert Rusche

  4. Department of Orthopedics, Elisabeth Hospital, Ruhr-University of Bochum, Bochum, Germany

    Roland Willburger

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  1. Kerstin Konietzny
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  2. Omar Chehadi
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  3. Irmgard Streitlein-Böhme
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  4. Herbert Rusche
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  5. Roland Willburger
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  6. Monika Ilona Hasenbring
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kerstin Konietzny.

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Funding

This study was supported by a research grant from the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft: HA 1684) awarded to MIH.

Conflict of Interest

The authors have no conflict of interest to declare.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. This article does not contain any studies with animals performed by any of the authors.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Additional information

This article was updated to correct the author names.

A correction to this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1007/s12529-017-9709-5.

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Konietzny, K., Chehadi, O., Streitlein-Böhme, I. et al. Mild Depression in Low Back Pain: the Interaction of Thought Suppression and Stress Plays a Role, Especially in Female Patients. Int.J. Behav. Med. 25, 207–214 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12529-017-9657-0

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