The contrasting influence of depressive and hyperthymic temperaments on psychometrically derived manic subtypes

Abstract

The present investigation focused on symptomatological subtypes of mania and their relationships with affective temperaments and other clinical features of bipolar disorder. In 153 inpatients with mania diagnosed according to DSM-III-R, symptomatological subtypes have been investigated by means of principal component factor analysis of 18 selected items of the Comprehensive Psychopathological Rating Scale (CPRS). We compared other clinical features, depressive and hyperthymic temperamental attributes, and first degree-family history for mood disorders among the various manic subtypes on the basis of the highest z-scores obtained on each CPRS factor (dominant CPRS factor groups). Five factors — Depressive, Irritable–Agitated, Euphoric–Grandiose, Accelerated–Sleepless, Paranoid–Anxious — emerged, accounting for 59.8% of the total variance. When the factor-based groups were compared, significant differences emerged in terms of the duration of the current episodes, rates of chronicity and incongruent psychotic features — being highest in the ‘Depressive’ and ‘Paranoid–Anxious’ dominant groups. The patients with highest z-scores for the ‘Euphoric–Grandiose’, ‘Paranoid–Anxious’ and ‘Accelerated–Sleepless’ factors were those most likely to belong to the hyperthymic temperament, while the ‘Depressive’ dominant group had the highest rate of depressive temperament. Finally, it is noteworthy that the ‘Irritable–Agitated’ group was high for both temperaments. The foregoing multidimensional structure of mania — revealing five factors — is generally concordant with the emerging literature. Consistently with our original hypothesis, a hyperthymic temperament seems to underlie the most extreme manic excitement with euphoric–accelerated–paranoid phenomenology. By contrast, the depressive temperament seemed to mute the expression of mania into a depressive–manic phenomenology.