DYSFUNCTIONAL PARENTING - OVER-REPRESENTATION IN NONMELANCHOLIC DEPRESSION AND CAPACITY OF SUCH SPECIFICITY TO REFINE SUB-TYPING DEPRESSIONMEASURES

We examine the proposition that dysfunctional parenting is more likely to be experienced by those with non-melancholic (compared to melancho lic) depression and that, as a consequence, such specificity allows th e validity of varying definitions of melancholia to be examined and th eir utility sharpened. We study a sample of 245 non-psychotic patients meeting DSM-III-R criteria for a major depressive episode and assign them to melancholic and non-melancholic sub-sets according to five sep arate sub-typing measures (DSM-III-R; DSM-IV; Newcastle; 'Clinical' an d CORE criteria). We assess dysfunctional parenting by use of the Pare ntal Bonding Instrument (PBI), and by structured psychiatrist assessme nt and self-report ratings of a range of dysfunctional parental experi ences, with independent assessment of the last by reports from corrobo rative witnesses and from the patients' referring therapists. The five sub-typing measures assigned varying percentages of the sample (24-42 %) to a 'melancholic' sub-type. When Newcastle Index assignments were examined, there was no evidence that dysfunctional parenting had any s pecificity to non-melancholic depression. Neither the DSM-III-R nor DS M-TV systems demonstrated specificity in relation to PBI scores, but s everal interview-assessed dysfunctional parenting characteristics were over-represented in their non-melancholic sub-sets. 'Clinical' defini tion showed the greatest over-representation of dysfunctional parentin g to those assigned as having non-melancholic depression. The CORE mea sure, a behaviourally weighted measure of psychomotor disturbance, was the next most differentiating. Importantly, those assigned as having non-melancholic depression by all five measures were more likely to be rated by corroborative witnesses as being exposed to anomalous parent ing, validating the subjects' self-reports, arguing against results be ing an artefact of clinician-based assessment, and supporting the spec ificity of dysfunctional parenting to a depressive sub-type. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.