Depressed patients' parental representations: stability across changes in depressed mood and specificity across diagnoses

Abstract

Parental representations of a Dutch sample of psychiatric patients with diagnoses of dysthymia and unipolar depression were compared with those of a matched sample of non-depressed patients and a matched sample of healthy controls. No differences in recalled parental rearing styles were found between depressives with a diagnosis of dysthymia and those with a diagnosis of unipolar depression. Depressive did not differ from the mixed (but non-depressed) sample of psychiatric patients, whereas both the depressed and the mixed group of patients reported more adverse parenting than the healthy controls. Analysis of repeated measurements of parental representations showed that memories of parental behavior were highly stable across clinically significant changes in depressed mood, so that it seems unlikely that patients' relatively negative recollections of their parents' behavior were due to mood state dependent recall. Results are discussed within the framework of depression theories and with regard to the validity and utility of self-report instruments for parental rearing styles.