Developing an integrative framework of goal flexibility, depression, and anxiety symptomatology

Mental health is a global priority, with disorders such as depression and anxiety projected to become leading causes of disease worldwide by 2030.

This underscores the urgent need for innovative research to understand protective factors and inform preventive measures.

My fellowship aims to explore the potential protective effects of goal flexibility—the ability to adjust one’s goals and strategies in goal pursuit—against the development of depression and anxiety symptoms in emerging adults.

Currently, we have limited understanding of how goal flexibility and mental health dynamics unfold over time or how and when to promote goal flexibility.

By developing an integrative conceptual framework and adopting contemporary dynamic approaches such as ecological momentary assessment and computational modelling, I will demonstrate how these processes unfold over time.

In this fellowship, I will pursue three research objectives: firstly, I will conduct a systematic review to develop a new conceptual framework linking goal flexibility and mental health processes; second, I will perform an empirical study using ecological momentary assessment to preliminarily evaluate the framework; and third, I will utilize computational modelling to simulate the proposed model, and to refine the conceptual framework.

By achieving these objectives, this fellowship will guide future practices in developing personalized interventions for depression and anxiety.

It will identify modifiable factors at critical time points, enabling the prevention or reversal of mental health symptoms.