Problems in making differential diagnoses and severity ratings of depressive-like reactions in chronically, heavily stressed persons are described. These assessment concerns are especially pertinent to older persons. The assessment concern discussed relates to difficulties in determining the extent to which stress reactions are inevitable consequences of stressor demands versus excessive pathological reactions versus natural manifestations of aging. The newly revised criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 3rd edition (DSM-III-R) and its associated structured interviews do not lessen the difficulties described. However, they reflect progress in specifying the amount of cross-sectional and longitudinal consistency required before maladaptive behaviours meet diagnostic and/or severity criteria as pathological indicators. Stressor level is important among the criteria for the less severe DSM-III-R depression-related disorders, but the specific response demands of the stressors are ignored. By contrast, biomedical factors are consistently given significant weight. To clarify these matters, the five DSM-III-R diagnostic axes, depressive diagnostic criteria, and associated structured interviews for eliciting relevant data are reviewed.

This study deals with the self-rated impact of caring for a spouse with Alzheimer's disease at home. Impacts on the caregiver's marriage, work, recreation and mood were investigated as a function of the patient's disability level and of the coping resources which caregivers reported were available to and/or used by them. The patient's disability level had a more negative impact on the caregiver's marriage and recreation than did the coping resource variables whereas the reverse was true for work. The caregiver's work was the only life area in which the availability and mobilization of coping resources influenced the caregiver's level of depression. To clarify these results, additional regression analyses were conducted separately for homemakers and employed subjects. While mobilized coping resources (social activity level and homemaking activity level) were correlated with depression among homemakers, none of the indicators of mobilized coping resources was correlated with depression among workers. These findings suggest that the role in which stress occurs is an important factor in understanding stress and the coping process.

Errors made in the coding of a set of 1,209 relatively structured questionnaires were examined in an effort to discover characteristics of the data set and of the coding instructions which contributed to the occurrence of error. Items included in the questionnaire were ordered with respect to the complexity of the coding task involved. The number of errors per decision was found to vary directly with the level of complexity of the task. Closer examination of the types of decisions involved, including the computation of proportion agreement with criterion codes and validity coefficients, revealed sources of error within different levels of complexity. The use of non-mutually exclusive sets of coding categories was found to introduce error into the coding process, and it is suggested that this error is not reflected in resultant measures of reliability and validity. Decisions made in a series applying the same set of categories to a number of similar responses within an item were found to effect lower validity coefficients for later decisions in the series. ecent research has focused attention on the nature . and sources of error generated in the process of coding sociological data (Kammeyer and Roth, 1971; Crittenden and Hill, 1971;Crittenden, 1971). Though each investigation has dealt with a slightly different aspect of the coding process, there has been agreement that certain types of materials present the coder with a more complex task than other types of materials.

The relationship between drug and alcohol use and self-esteem was investigated using students living in a co-ed dormitory. A questionnaire was distributed containing four sections including demographic information, the Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory (1967), an A Priori Identity Crisis scale, and a frequency of drug/alcohol use scale. 66% of the questionnaires were returned, yielding a sample of 171 males and 219 females. Heavy use of alcohol was related to low self-esteem. No relationship, however, was found between drug use and self-esteem. The relationship between drug and alcohol use and psychopathology is discussed as being a continuum.

No abstract