Mood monitoring What’s it all about? By: Elizabeth Whitaker, Lauren Barnes, Meagan Camp, Jessica Bouknight, Chesley Foxworth, Samantha Sammis

Who is mood monitoring for? Anyone Mood disorders Depression Bipolar (Audio) Mood monitoring can be for anyone looking to understand how they feel and why they feel the way that they do. In psychology, mood monitoring is often used for people suffering from depression, bipolar, or other mood disorders.

To facilitate recognition of the variability and the mood swings associated with feelings or emotions Helps identify: Patterns Triggers Aids in managing disorder What is it all about? Mood monitoring helps individuals recognize how their feelings and emotions vary or change depending on circumstances. It can be used to point out differences in shifts of bio-psycho-social changes, such as changes in diet, sleep patterns, or medical effects. Those who struggle with mood disorders may have difficulty doing this, so it helps identify patterns and triggers for them to better understand their disorder. This promotes active involvement in the management of their disorder.

What do you do? Create a Mood Chart Simple to complex Self-reporting Promotes involvement in understanding and improving mood Aids in managing lifestyle What do you do? In order to monitor mood and begin to understand patterns, client will engage in completing a mood chart daily for a set period of time. A mood chart can range from being simple to complex, depending on the number of variables it identifies or client aims collect. It is self-reporting and done outside of therapy at highest or lowest points of mood throughout the day. At the end of the measuring period, clients are able to compare changes and observe mood trends throughout their daily lifestyle.

This is an example of a mood chart This is an example of a mood chart. As you can see, there is a column for each day, where client will indicate high or low mood, depending on how they perceived mood for the day. If you have high and low moods on same day, client will place two dots. This chart also includes data about number of hours slept, weight, anxiety, medications, and other potential helpful information. This may look daunting, but can be simplified depending on client and need.

What about follow-up? Note changes in mood Discuss thoughts at time of mood changes Reminder of events to discuss Increase engagement in positive events What about follow-up? Once this has been completed, the client can note shifts, thoughts they were having at the time of mood changes, and reminders for big events to discuss with therapist. The goal is to see what increases a client's mood, so he or she is able to engage in this more often.

Summary Understand thoughts, feelings, and emotions Great tool for therapists to use Ignite motivation for change Summary Mood monitoring is a way to help anyone better understand their thoughts, feelings, and emotions that occur. This is a great tool to use for recording daily activities and discussing these with therapist in order to improve or increase positive experiences. It also helps ignite motivation to problem solve for difficult areas in life, develop better coping strategies, and address harmful repetitive patterns.