Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is a depressive disorder characterized by recurrent episodes most often beginning in the fall and remitting... Show moreSeasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is a depressive disorder characterized by recurrent episodes most often beginning in the fall and remitting in spring and summer. Individuals with SAD experience both vegetative symptoms (e.g., fatigue, increased appetite and weight gain, and an increased need for sleep) and psychological symptoms (e.g., sadness, difficulty concentrating, and feelings of worthlessness or hopelessness. In addition to the seasonal variations in vegetative and psychological functioning in SAD, daily weather also can potentially affect these phenomena. Symptoms such as mood, cognition, and energy can vary between and within days as a function of weather variables in a population experiencing seasonal symptoms. Using experience sampling method (ESM), which allows for less reliance on participant memory, we examined the impact of weather on day-to-day variability of mood and fatigue, and specifically in individuals with seasonal symptoms. To our knowledge, this is the first study to use ESM to examine the impact of weather on this symptomatology. Results failed to find evidence of a relationship between variability in daily weather and either daily mood or fatigue in this sample of seasonal individuals. This was the case for both same day weather and weather aggregated over the previous six days. Future studies would benefit from a longer data collection period in order to determine if there are long-term effects of weather variables on mood or fatigue. ESM would be useful in studying the effect of various time-varying variables on a variety of time-related aspects of SAD symptomatology. M.S. in Psychology, May 2016 Show less
Assessing impairment in daily functioning is an important part of a mental health evaluation and of monitoring progress in treatment. The... Show moreAssessing impairment in daily functioning is an important part of a mental health evaluation and of monitoring progress in treatment. The Seasonality Assessment Form (SAF; Young, et al., 2014) included a measure to assess the degree of impairment in daily functioning associated with these symptoms. The 5 yes/no impairment items were written to reflect the ways that patients intuitively describe their levels of impairment. However, the items are not mutually exclusive and are not summative so that impairment severity is represented by the configural pattern of responses. This paper examined the nature of response patterns and how to use them to generate an impairment severity score. M.S. in Psychology, May 2016 Show less
