Metacognition
Does rumination lead to worry, or worry to rumination?
Open access · cc by · source: Europe PMC
In students with strong unhelpful beliefs about their own thinking, rumination predicted more worry three months later, but worry did not predict later rumination.
Study at a glance
- Design
- Cohort — Two-wave online survey three months apart analysed with a multigroup autoregressive cross-lagged structural equation model, split at the mean on metacognitive beliefs
- N
- N=482 · All respondents across the two waves; roughly half completed both waves and the rest only one (missing data handled by full-information maximum likelihood)
- Population
- Non-clinical university students in Norway
- Outcome
- Worry (Penn State Worry Questionnaire) and rumination (Ruminative Response Scale) at each wave
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Key findings
Worry and rumination were both quite stable over three months in both groups. Earlier worry did not predict later rumination in either group. Earlier rumination predicted later worry only in the high metacognitive-belief group, and when rumination was broken into parts, only brooding carried this effect. Women reported more current worry and rumination.
Methodology
Norwegian university students completed questionnaires on worry, rumination and metacognitive beliefs (beliefs about one's own thoughts, such as that worrying is uncontrollable) twice, three months apart. The sample was split at the mean into high and low metacognitive-belief groups. A cross-lagged model tested whether each type of thinking at the first wave predicted the other at the second wave, controlling for its own earlier level, age, gender and education.
Limitations
This is a non-clinical student sample with only two waves, so it cannot show causation or how thinking changes within a person over time; the authors note that cross-lagged panel models make weak causal claims. Splitting at the mean throws away information, and the low-belief group showed floor effects that may hide real relationships. A single three-month gap was assumed for all effects, and the separate subscales of metacognitive beliefs were not examined.
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