Autobiographical Memory Test

In this study, we used the written form of AMT developed by Heron et al. (2012). Respondents are requested to retrieve a personal memory located in a specific time, which is related to the cue word. If the participants recall a memory referring to a long period of time (more than 1 day) or a category of the events, the recorded memory should be coded as over-general. The written form of AMT follows the same scoring system and similar instructions to the original form. Unlike the original form (Williams and Broadbent, 1986), the written form is completely self-report, and it does not need in-person assessment interviews with a tester. Moreover, this form does not include a time limitation to write down the memories. The written form of the AMT includes five positive (excited, happy, lucky, relaxed, and relieved) and five negative cue words (bored, failure, hopeless, lonely, and sad). At the beginning of the test, participants receive a written instruction as well as an example of what they are expected to do. In this study, the frequency of over-general memories was the focus of the assessments, and it could vary between 0 and 10 for each participant. The written form of the AMT has shown acceptable inter-rater reliability (kappa = 0.74–0.93) and its psychometric features have been confirmed through past studies (Heron et al., 2012; Takano et al., 2017). In our study this scoring system showed an appropriate internal consistency (α = 0.76).