New research suggests that blocking out fearful thoughts could reduce symptoms of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
Could you do it? Most likely not — that pink elephant was probably on your mind. Psychologists have long used this example to illustrate that suppressing a thought only makes it more intrusive. By the same logic, suppressing fears or anxieties is commonly assumed to negatively impact one's mental health.
Their research involved 120 adults from 16 countries, who were each asked to list 20 fears about things that might happen in the future, 20 hopes and 36 neutral events, such a visit to the eye doctor. Half of the participants were told to stare at one of their negative words for a few seconds without letting their minds wander into more distressing thoughts. For comparison, the other half were given the same assignment, only with their neutral words.
Participants who reported high levels of anxiety to start saw their self-reported worries decline by 44%, on average. Among people with post-traumatic stress, their overall negative mental health fell by an average of 16%, while their positive mental health increased by nearly 10%. Three months after the experiment was over, around 80% of participants said they had continued to use the thought suppression techniques they learned in the study to control their fears. Anderson said the researchers looked for evidence that people’s fears were bouncing back or becoming more intense but didn’t find any sign of that.
"Freud said repression is a defense mechanism. It makes you feel better in the moment, but you’re just shoving stuff down into the unconscious and it’s going to come back and influence you indirectly," Anderson said.
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