Trial reportJournal of abnormal psychology2012
Walk on the bright side: physical activity and affect in major depressive disorder.
Trial report in Journal of abnormal psychology, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 70 papers, 5 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
70 citing papers in PubMed, 5 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Real-time experience: A systematic review of ecological momentary assessments of everyday functioning in major depressive disorder.Australian occupational therapy journal · 2026Pooled it
- Within-person association between affect and physical activity related to depressive symptomatology: A systematic review and methodological reflections.Applied psychology. Health and well-being · 2025Pooled it
- Exploring the digital footprint of depression: a PRISMA systematic literature review of the empirical evidence.BMC psychiatry · 2022Pooled it
- Physical Activity Promotes Health and Reduces Cardiovascular Mortality in Depressed Populations: A Literature Overview.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Pooled it
- Compliance and Retention With the Experience Sampling Method Over the Continuum of Severe Mental Disorders: Meta-Analysis and Recommendations.Journal of medical Internet research · 2019Pooled it
- Exercise holds immediate benefits for affect and cognition in younger and older adults.Psychology and aging · 2013Trial
- Acute exercise attenuates negative affect following repeated sad mood inductions in persons who have recovered from depression.Journal of abnormal psychology · 2013Trial
- Lifestyle factors moderate emotion-gait coupling in young adults.Experimental brain research · 2026Article
- Group, Subgroup and Person-Specific Longitudinal Associations Between Physical Activity and Affect in Individuals With and Without Depressive and Anxiety Disorders.International journal of methods in psychiatric research · 2026Article
- Determinants of physical activity and exercise in individuals with mental illness: results from a large cross-sectional online survey.BMJ open · 2025Article
- Assessing seasonal and weather effects on depression and physical activity using mobile health data.Npj mental health research · 2025Article
- Complex interplay between emotional states and gait parameters: a domain-specific investigation in healthy young adults.Experimental brain research · 2025Article
- The Dynamic Association Between Physical Activity and Psychological Symptoms in Young People With Major Depressive Disorder: An Active and Passive Sensing Longitudinal Cohort Study.Early intervention in psychiatry · 2025Article
- COVID-19's gendered effect on subjective wellbeing in MENA countries.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Daily reciprocal relationships between affect, physical activity, and sleep in middle and later life.Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine · 2025Article
- Mind-wandering in daily life in depressed individuals: An experience sampling study.Journal of affective disorders · 2024Article
- Physical Activity Participation among Children and Youth with Mental Health Symptoms: Clinician Perspectives.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Negative affect instability predicts elevated depressive and generalized anxiety disorder symptoms even when negative affect intensity is controlled for: an ecological momentary assessment study.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- The potential causal relationship between various lifestyles and depression: a univariable and multivariable Mendelian randomization study.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Article
- Keeping Things Positive: Affect as a Mediator between Physical Activity and Psychological Functioning.European journal of investigation in health, psychology and education · 2023Article
10 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Although prescribed exercise has been found to improve affect and reduce levels of depression, we do not know how self-initiated everyday physical activity influences levels of positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA) in depressed persons. Fifty-three individuals diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and 53 never-depressed controls participated in a seven-day experience sampling study. Participants were prompted randomly eight times per day and answered questions about their physical activity and affective state. Over the week, the two groups of participants did not differ in average level of physical activity. As expected, participants with MDD reported lower average PA and higher average NA than did never-depressed controls. Both participants with MDD and controls reported higher levels of PA at prompts after physical activity than at prompts after inactive periods; moreover, for both groups of participants, PA increased from a prompt after an inactive period to a subsequent prompt at which activity was reported. Depressed participants in particular showed a dose-response effect of physical activity on affect: longer duration and/or higher intensity of physical activity increased their PA significantly more than did short duration and/or lower intensity physical activity. Physical activity did not influence NA in either group. In contrast to previous treatment studies that examined the effects of prescribed structured exercise, this investigation showed that self-initiated physical activity influences PA. These findings also underscore the importance of distinguishing between PA and NA to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the effects of physical activity on affect in MDD.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.