The Causal Relations of Attributions for Interpersonal Events to Depression: A Prospective Longitudinal Study

Abstract

The causal relations between attributions for naturally occurring interpersonal events and depression were examined using a prospective longitudinal design. Partial empirical support was obtained for the hypothesis that self-deprecating attributional tendencies accompany a depressed state. Currently depressed subjects made more internal attributions for unpleasant interpersonal events than did normal controls but did not reliably differ in this tendency from nondepressed psychopathology controls. The hypotheses that negative attributions temporally precede the onset of depression or persist beyond symptomatic recovery were not supported. An evaluation of the diathesis–stress prediction of the reformulated learned helplessness theory of depression revealed that neither attributions for unpleasant interpersonal events, life stress, nor interactions between attributions and life stress were predictive of future depressive symptomatology. Implications for the reformulated model and future research pertaining ...