Brief Mindset Intervention Can Reduce Depression, Inflammation

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27, 2025 (HealthDay News) — A brief mindset intervention can reduce inflammation and depressive symptom levels, according to a study published online Aug. 26 in Brain, Behavior and Immunity.

Jesse A. Barrera, from Stanford University in California, and colleagues conducted a randomized clinical trial to examine the effect of an intervention that promotes the mindset that “catastrophes can be opportunities in the long-term” on mental health and well-being two years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants were randomly assigned to a mindset intervention or control group (226 and 153 individuals, respectively). The mindset group watched five brief videos and wrote about their mindsets toward the COVID-19 pandemic and how these could encourage or discourage posttraumatic growth, while the control group watched videos of the chronology of the pandemic and answered questions reviewing their knowledge.

The researchers found that at three months, there were significant reductions in C-reactive protein and depressive symptom levels with the mindset intervention. The effects of the intervention on posttraumatic growth, depressive symptoms, and other domains of mental health and well-being were significantly mediated by changes in mindset.

“We would have liked to avoid the COVID-19 pandemic, but it came regardless,” senior author Alia J. Crum, Ph.D., also from Stanford University, said in a statement. “In the postpandemic era, we face a choice: We can let it recede into memory, leaving us depleted and disillusioned, or we can choose to look back, learn from it, and grow — both personally and collectively.”

Abstract/Full Text