What does this rating mean?
Pleasant activities are any kinds of actives that you find enjoyable, such a reading a book, watching a movie, or meeting a friend for coffee. Activity scheduling is a type of therapy where you regularly set aside time to do these activities.
Scheduling activities is a component of cognitive behaviour therapy, and pleasant activities may form part of positive psychology interventions.
For more evidence on some specific types of activities, see the pages below:
There is a theory that a lack of pleasant activities might be a cause of depression. It is thought that if depressed people do pleasant activities more often, it will help their depression. Some types of activities, like reading a book, might promote relaxation. Other types of activities, like meeting up with a friend, can increase social contact.
Anyone can engage in pleasant activities as a once-off event. Activity scheduling takes a more structured approach and involves identifying the types of actives you enjoy and setting aside time each week to do them. You can also note down how you feel before and after doing the activity. Activity scheduling could be done on your own, or with the help of a therapist.
Engaging in pleasant activities is an important component of cognitive behaviour therapy for depression. This type of therapy is known to be effective. However, there is less research on whether pleasant activities on their own are helpful for depression.
One meta-analysis found that activity scheduling was effective at reducing depression symptoms, and that it was about as effective as other psychological therapies. However, the some of the studies included in the analysis were not of high quality.
One study looked at the effectiveness of activity scheduling for the management of depression in older adults. Activity scheduling was associated with a reduction in depression symptoms.
There is not much research looking at whether activity scheduling without the help of a therapist is effective at treating depression.
There are no known disadvantages.
This is a treatment that anyone could do on their own or with help of a therapist.
Scheduling time to do pleasant activities seems to be helpful at treating depression, especially when done as part of cognitive behaviour therapy. There is less evidence that pleasant activities are helpful on their own for depression.
Last reviewed and updated: 1 May 2019
These treatments are very useful. They are strongly supported as effective by scientific evidence.
These treatments are useful. They are supported by scientific evidence as effective, but the evidence is not as strong.
These treatments have not been properly researched. It is not possible to say whether they are useful or not.