Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T10:06:53.264Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Categories of Depression: Reported Life Events in a Controlled Design

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Traolach S. Brugha  and
Ronan Conroy
Traolach S. Brugha*
Affiliation:
M.R.C. Social Psychiatry Research Unit, Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF. St. Vincent's Hospital, Elm Park, Dublin 4, Ireland
Ronan Conroy
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, St. Vincent's Hospital
*
∗Correspondence
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In a case control study, 32 onset cases of depression, separated into PSE-CATEGO Categories N and R, were compared with individually matched symptom free general practice attenders. Combining both categories of depressives together a significantly greater number reported an Undesirable Life Event and a Threatening Life Event in the six months prior to onset, compared with their matched controls. Significantly more CATEGO R (retarded or endogenous) depressives reported an Independent Threatening event than their matched controls. These findings do not support the view that depression secondary to a major life event is more likely to be mild in character.

Type
Papers
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 147 , Issue 6 , December 1985 , pp. 641 - 646
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andrews, G. & Tennant, C. (1978) Life events stress and psychiatric illness: a review. Psychological Medicine, 8, 545–549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Armitage (1971) Statistical Methods in Medical Research. London: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Bebbington, P. E., Tennant, C. & Hurry, J. (1981) Adversity and the nature of psychiatric disorder in the community. Journal of Affective Disorders, 3, 345–366.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bebbington, P. E. (1985) Psychosocial aetiology of schizophrenia and affective disorders. In Psychiatry (ed. Michels, R.). Philadelphia: Lippincott.Google Scholar
Benjaminsen, S. (1981) Stressful life events preceding the onset of neurotic depression. Psychological Medicine, 11, 369–378.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, G. W., Sklair, F., Harris, T. O. & Blrley, J. L. (1973) Life events and psychiatric disorders. Part 1: some methodological. issues. Psychological Medicine, 3, 74–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Harris, T. (1978) Social Origins of epression: A Study of Psychiatric Disorder in Women. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W., Bhrolchain, Ni & Harris, T. O. (1979) Psychotic and neurotic depression. Part 3: aetiological and background factors. Journal of Affective Disorders, 1, 195–211.Google Scholar
Brugha, T., Conroy, R., Walsh, N., Delaney, W., O'Hanlon, J., Dondero, E., Daly, L., Hickey, N. & Bourke, G. (1982) Social networks, attachments and support in minor affective disorders: A replication. British Journal of Psychiatry, 141, 249–255.Google Scholar
Brugha, T. (1983) ‘Dubliners’–a study of networks and neurosis in an Irish city. Paper presented at 7th World Congress of Psychiatry, Vienna. July 11–16, 1983.Google Scholar
Brugha, T. (1984) Personal losses and deficiencies in social networks. Social Psychiatry, 19, 69–74.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brugha, T., Bebbington, P., Tennant, C. & Hurry, J. (1985) The list of threatening experiences: a subset of 12 life event categories with considerable long term contextual threat. Psychological Medicine. 15, 189–194.Google Scholar
Dohrenwend, B. S. & Dohrenwend, B. P. (1974) Overview and prospects for research on stressful life events. In Stressful Life Events: Their Nature and Effects (eds. Dohrenwend, B. S. & Dohrenwend, B. P.). New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Flighnbr, J. P., Robins, E. Guze, S. B., Woodruff, R. A., Winokur, G. & Munoz, R. (1972) Diagnostic criteria for use in psychiatric research. Archives of General Psychiatry, 26, 57–63.Google Scholar
Feinstein, A. R. & Horowitz, R. I. (1982) Double standards, scientific methods and epidemiological research. New England Journal of Medicine, 307, 1611–1617.Google Scholar
Garmany, G. (1958) Depressive states: their aetiology and treatment. British Medical Journal, 3, 341–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, D. P. (1972) The detection of psychiatric illness by questionnaire. Institute of Psychiatry, Maudsley Monographs No. 21, London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Goldberg, E. L. & Comstock, G. W. (1980) Epidemiology of life events: frequency in general populations. American Journal of Epidemiology, 111, 736–752.Google Scholar
Henderson, S., Byrne, D. G., Duncan-Jones, P. (1981) Neurosis and the Social Environment. Sydney: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Katschnig, H., Brandl-Nebehay, A., Fuchs-Robetin, G., Seelig, P., Eichberger, G., Strobi, R. & Sint, P. P. (1981) Levensverandernde Ereignisse, psycho/iale Dispositionen und depressive Verstimmung/ustande. Abteilung fur Sozialpsycatrie und Dokumentation. Psychiatrische Universitatsklinik, Wien.Google Scholar
Katschnig, H. (1984) Commentary on: Bebbington, P. E. — Inferring causes: some constraints in the social psychiatry of depressive disorders. Integrative Psychiatry, 2(2), 69–80.Google Scholar
Leff, M. J., Roatch, J. F. & Buney, W. E. (1970). Environmental factors preceding the onset of severe depressions. Psychiatry, 33, 293–311.Google Scholar
Lewis, A. J. (1938) States of depression: their clinical and aetiological differentiation. British Medical Journal, 2, 875–878.Google Scholar
Myers, J. K., Lindenthal, J. J. & Pepper, M. P. (1974) Social class, life events and psychiatric symptoms. In Stressful Life Events: Their Nature and Effects, (eds. Dohrenwend, B. S. & Dohrenwend, B. P.) New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., Prusoff, B. & Klerman, G. L., (1971a) The endogenous-neurotic continuum in depression: rater independence and factor distributions. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 8, 73–90.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S. (1974a) Life stress and psychiatric disorder. In Stressful Life Events; Their Nature and Effects (eds. Dohrenwend, B. S & Dohrenwend, B. P.). New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S. (1974b) Recent life events and clinical depression. In Life Stress and Illness, (eds. Gunderson, E. K. & Rahe, B. H.) Springfield, Illinois: Charles C. Thomas.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., Prusoff, B. A., & Uhlenhuth, E. H. (1971b) Scaling of life events. Archives of General Psychiatry, 25, 340–347.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., MCGUINESS, B. & Gomez, J. (1976) An Anglo-American comparison of the scaling of life events. British Journal of Medical Psychology, 49, 237–247.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S. (1982) Handbook of Affective Disorders. London: Churchill Livingstone.Google Scholar
Tennant, C. & Andrews, G. (1976) a scale to measure the stress of life events. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 10, 27–32.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., Bebbington, P. E. & Hurry, J. (1981a) The role of life events in depressive illness–Is there a substantial causal relation? Psychological Medicine, 11, 379–389.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., Bebbington, P. E. & Hurry, J. (1981b) The short term outcome of neurotic disorders in the community–The relation of remission to clinical factors and to ‘neutralising’ life events. British Journal of Psychiatry, 139, 213–220.Google Scholar
Thomson, K. C. & Hendrie, H. C. (1972) Environmental stress in primary depressive illness. Archives of General Psychiatry, 26, 130–132.Google Scholar
Wing, J. K. & Bebbington, P. (1982). Epidemiology of depressive disorders in the community. Journal of Affective Disorders, 4, 331–345.Google Scholar
Wing, J. K., Cooper, J. E. & Sartorius, N. (1974) The Measurement and Classification of Psychiatric Symptoms–an Instruction Manual for the Present State Examination and CATEGO Program. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wing, J. K. & Sturt, P. (1978) The PSE-ID-CATEGO system. Supplementary manual. London: Institute of Psychiatry (Mimeo).Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.