Depressive Attributional Style and the Dexamethasone Suppression Test: Relationship to the Endogenous/Melancholic Distinction and to Each Other

Abstract

The dexamethasone suppression test (DST) and the depressive attributional style questionnaire (ASQ) were administered to 105 depressed patients prior to participation in a double-blind outpatient study and to 29 normal controls. The depressed patients were classified into three groups (1) met criteria for both research diagnostic criteria for definite endogenous depression and DSM III melancholia; (2) met criteria for neither, and (3) met criteria for one but not both. The group that met criteria for both RDC endogenous depression and DSM-III melancholia had a statistically greater frequency of abnormal DST versus the group that met neither criteria and the normal controls. With regard to ASQ, patients who met both criteria had statistically higher bad event internality scores but statistically lower bad event stability and globality scores as opposed to the group that met neither criteria. In general, normal controls had significantly lower bad event ASQ scores than the three depressive groups. There was no correlation between ASQ and DST, as both DST suppressors and nonsuppressors had similar ASQ scores and there was no correlation between ASQ bad event attributions and initial severity of depression.

Validity of Sudden Gains in Acute Phase Treatment of Depression.

“…The ASQ-F's alpha internal consistency (.72) and 5-week retest reliability (.64) have been adequate in past research (Peterson et al, 1982). Validity is supported through moderate correlations with self-report measures of depressive symptoms and self-concept (Tennen, Herzberger, & Nelson, 1987) and higher scores in depressed individuals compared with controls (Peselow & Fieve, 1992). Alpha internal consistency was.89 and.91 in the atypical and recurrent depression data sets, respectively.…”

Changes in cognitive content during and following cognitive therapy for recurrent depression: Substantial and enduring, but not predictive of change in depressive symptoms.

“…We pooled data using methods summarized by Kendall and Sheldrick (2000) that weight studies' mean and standard deviation statistics by sample size to derive a population estimate. We pooled data from three reports (Fear, Sharp, & Healy, 1996; Heimberg et al, 1989; Jack & Williams, 1991) to derive SUCC norms ( M = 4.78, SD = 0.59) and from these reports plus three additional reports (Eaves & Rush, 1984; Peselow & Fieve, 1992; Zimmerman, Coryell, Corenthal, & Wilson, 1986) to derive FAIL norms ( M = 3.94, SD = 0.62). For the SEF, we used norms from a large representative sample in the United States ( M = 90.62, SD = 12.65; Lansford et al, 2005).…”

Atypical depression and non-atypical depression: Is HPA axis function a biomarker? A systematic review

“…Contributing to the debate about the correct classification, or the ability of a certain definition of melancholia to identify non-suppressors, Peselow et al (1992) demonstrated that patients who met both DSM-III criteria for melancholia and RDC criteria for endogenous depression, showed higher rates on non-suppression than those with «neither» subtype and controls, but not compared to those with «either of» the subtypes (Peselow et al, 1992). Paslakis et al (2011) also used DSM-IV (SCID-validated) criteria for melancholia, and although they did demonstrate a significant difference in suppression levels between melancholic depressed patients and controls, both the mean effect size and the sensitivity of the test proved low (Paslakis et al, 2011).…”