| Background Prospective memory refers to the ability to carry out a plan at a certain time in the future, and the improvement of prospective memory can help depressed patients return to society. Previous studies have not reached a consensus on the influence of target characteristics on prospective memory, so the impact of target characteristics (emotional titer and salience) on prospective memory of depressed patients is discussed. Methods 45 depressed patients and 45 healthy subjects were recruited as subjects. A three-factor mixed experimental design of 2 (subjects type: depressed group, healthy group) ×2 (target prominence: prominent, not prominent) ×3 (emotional titer: positive, neutral, negative) was adopted, and the response time and accuracy of prospective memory with different target characteristics were recorded by double-task experimental paradigm. Results ① The main effect of the subject type was statistically significant. The correct rate of the depressed group was lower than that of the healthy group (F=14.89, P < 0.01), and the prospective memory response of the depressed group was slower than that of the healthy group (F=10.64, P < 0.01). ②The main effect was statistically significant (F=7.58, P < 0.01) and reaction time (F=3.19, P < 0.05). Simple effect showed that the reaction time of negative target was faster than that of positive target (F=17.20, P < 0.01), and the correct rate was higher than that of positive target (F=12.97, P < 0.01). In the healthy group, the response time of positive target was faster than that of negative target (F=7.84, P < 0.01). ③ The main effect of target prominence features was statistically significant, and the correct rate of target prominence was higher than that of unhighlighted target (F=6.66, P < 0.05), and the response time was faster than that of unhighlighted target (F=10.11, P < 0.01). Conclusion The patients with depression give priority attention to the negative prospective memory goals and process them preferentially. Target salience promotes automatic processing of prospective memory tasks in depressed patients. |