THE ROLE OF DEFEAT AND ENTRAPMENT (ARRESTED FLIGHT) IN DEPRESSION - AN EXPLORATION OF AN EVOLUTIONARY VIEW

Background. The social rank theory of psychopathology suggests that wi th the evolution of social hierarchies various psychobiological mechan isms became attuned to the success or failure in conflict situations. Specifically, subordinates and those who have lost status are at great er risk of pathology than winners and those of higher status. In this theory concepts of defeat and entrapment are seen to be of special rel evance to the study of depression. We outline the role of defeat and e ntrapment within the social rank theory of depression. Methods. New se lf-report measures of entrapment and defeat were developed and used to test predictions of the social rank theory of depression. Both a samp le of students and depressed patients were assessed with these new sca les and other social rank measures (e.g. social comparison and submiss ive behaviour). Results. The entrapment and defeat measures were found to have good psychometric properties and significantly correlated wit h depression. They were also strongly associated with other rank varia bles. Defeat maintained a strong association with depression even afte r controlling for hopelessness (r = 0.62), whereas the relationship be tween hopelessness and depression was substantially reduced when contr olling for defeat. Entrapment and defeat added substantially to the ex plained variance of depression after controlling for the other social rank variables. Conclusions. Defeat and entrapment appear to be promis ing variables for the study of depression. These variables may also he lp to develop linkages between human and animal models of psychopathol ogy.