A new study suggests that targeting positive emotions may be an effective treatment for depression. Positive Affect Treatment (PAT) works on the brain’s reward system, which helps people look forward to positive experiences, feel pleasure from them, and learn through rewarding.

The therapy aims to retrain the brain’s “positive system” through exercises that reconnect patients with rewarding activities, shift attention to positive experiences, and strengthen habits such as gratitude, savouring, and kindness. PAT works entirely through positive affect.