The primary aim of this randomized controlled clinical trial was to compare the outcome from two types of short-term psychodynamic psychotherapy. The participants were thirtynine women with depression. Half of the participants (n518) received art psychotherapy and the other half received verbal psychotherapy (n521). Data was collected before and after psychotherapy, and at a 3-month follow-up using self-rating scales and interviewer-based ratings. Results showed that art and verbal psychotherapies were comparable, and at follow-up, the average participant in both groups had few depressive symptoms and stress-related symptoms. The conclusion was that short-term psychodynamic art therapy could be a valuable treatment for depressed women.Depressive disorders account for more than 11% of the total number of years lived with disability in the world (Ü stün et al. 2004). During recent decades, a growing proportion of Swedish adults experience depressive symptoms, anxiety, elevated stress, and interpersonal problems.Many studies have shown that there are clear gender differences in prevalence as well as frequency and intensity of depression (Nolen-Hoeksema et al. 1999). Factors associated with depression, which are more likely to affect women than men, are low social status, and learned helplessness, generated by a lack of control over their life. A related factor is that the traditional work of women -rearing children and doing housework -often goes unrecognized (Jack 1991).A fourth significant factor is how depressed people manage their symptoms. Studies have shown that women tend to ruminate over their problem to a Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy ISSN 0266-8734 print/ISSN 1474-9734 online # 2007 The Association for Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy in the NHS

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Important, but not unequivocal, support has been found for Sociotropy and Autonomy as vulnerability factors for depression. Using a novel approach we gave subliminal sociotropy-related and autonomy-related visuoverbal stimulation to nondepressed students (Study 1, N = 36), and patients treated for clinical depression (Study 2, N = 34) in completely balanced within-groups designs. Autonomy, as measured with the Personal Style Inventory, was unrelated to response. Sociotropy predicted negative outcome after a sociotropy-related abandonment stimulus in both Study 1 (r = − .34 to a decrease in positively valenced autobiographical memories) and Study 2 (r = .38 to an increase in selection of depression-related words on a word-selection task). This finding may interest developers of depression therapies, and support further attempts to study Sociotropy as a putative vulnerability factor for depression.