Anxiety and depression distort self-esteem

Sometimes a person is less confident than they deserve to be. This is especially true for those who struggle with anxiety disorders or depression. A new discovery by British researchers explains where this gap between reality and perceptions of one’s abilities comes from.

The large study, published in the journal Nature Communications, involved more than 500 people. Participants were asked to perform different tasks in the form of a game and rate their confidence in each one. They then had to give an overall assessment of how they did overall. It is interesting that people with signs of anxiety and depression in forming a general self-assessment focused primarily on those moments in which they felt insecure, completely ignoring successful tasks.

To test this hypothesis, the scientists created a special computer game where participants “helped” the inhabitants of the fictional town of Fruitville with farming tasks. The tasks required visual attention and good memory. After each stage, players had to indicate how confident they felt in completing the task, and at the end of the round, they had to rate how they did overall.

An interesting point is that regardless of mental state, positive feedback from the “auditor” in the game helped participants feel more confident, while negative feedback, on the contrary, decreased their self-assessment. However, anxious and depressed participants’ self-esteem remained lower than others – even if they were objectively doing just as well.

The problem, according to the authors, is how such people perceive their achievements. They tend to place more importance on situations where they had doubts, while ignoring cases where confidence was high. This explains why anxiety and depression are often accompanied by imposter syndrome and a persistent feeling that you’re “failing” even when you’re not.

As study author Sucharit Katyal, now at the University of Copenhagen, explains, the conclusion is clear: negative self-evaluations often don’t reflect reality. It’s a distorted picture we paint of ourselves based on feelings rather than facts.

In the long term, this discovery may help to develop new approaches to therapy and support for people with impaired self-esteem. By understanding how these attitudes are formed, professionals will be better able to help people regain confidence – both in work and in life.