Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-sxzjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T17:38:50.764Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Depression and Loss

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

George W. Brown ,
Tirril Harris  and
John J. Copeland
George W. Brown
Affiliation:
Bedford College, Regents Park, London, N.W.1
Tirril Harris
Affiliation:
Bedford College, Regents Park, London, N.W.1
John J. Copeland
Affiliation:
University of Liverpool
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Recent losses occurring in the two years before onset of depression in women are distinguished from past losses occurring at any time before this. Of past losses only loss of mother before 11 is associated with greater risk of depression—both among women treated by psychiatrists and among women found to be suffering from depression in a random sample of 458 women living in London. Past loss of a father or sibling before 17 (or a mother between 11 and 17), or a child or husband, is not associated with a greater chance of developing depression. However, among patients all types of past loss by death are associated with psychotic-like depressive symptoms (and their severity) and other types of past loss with neurotic-type depressive symptoms (and their severity). It is argued that these associations probably reflect direct causal links, and a socio-psychological theory to explain them is discussed.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 130 , Issue 1 , January 1977 , pp. 1 - 18
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists 1977 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abraham, K. (1911) Notes on the psycho-analytical investigation and treatment of manic-depressive insanity and allied conditions. In Selected Papers on Psycho-Analysis. London: Hogarth, 1927.Google Scholar
Abrahams, M. J. & Whitlock, F. A. (1969) Childhood experience and depression. British Journal of Psychiatry, 115, 883–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Averill, J. R. (1968) Grief: its nature and significance. Psychological Bulletin, 70, 721–48.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Barraclough, B. M. & Bunch, J. (1973) Accuracy of dating parent deaths: recollected dates compared with death certificate dates. British Journal of Psychiatry, 123, 573–4.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beck, A. T., Sethi, B. B. & Tuthill, R. W. (1963) Childhood bereavement and adult depression. Archives of General Psychiatry, 9, 295–302.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beck, A. T. (1967) Depression: Clinical Experimental and Theoretical Aspects. New York: Harper and Row Inc.Google Scholar
Becker, E. (1962) Towards a comprehensive theory of depression. Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases, 135, 26–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Becker, J. (1974) Depression: Theory and Research. Washington: V. H. Winston.Google Scholar
Birtchnell, J. (1970a) Early parent death and mental illness. British Journal of Psychiatry, 116, 281–8.Google ScholarPubMed
Birtchnell, J. (1970b) Recent parent death and mental illness. British Journal of Psychiatry, 116, 289–97.Google Scholar
Birtchnell, J. (1970c) Depression in relation to early and recent parent death. British Journal of Psychiatry, 116, 299–306.Google Scholar
Birtchnell, J. (1972) Early parental death and psychiatric diagnosis. Social Psychiatry, 7, 202–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowlby, J. (1951) Maternal Care and Mental Health. W.H.O. Monograph No. 2. London: HMSO.Google Scholar
Bowlby, J. (1960) Separation anxiety. International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 41, 1–25.Google ScholarPubMed
Bowlby, J. (1963) Pathological mourning and childhood mourning. Journal of American Psychoanalytical Association, 11, 500–41.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowlby, J. (1973) Attachment and Loss, Volume 2: Separation, Anxiety and Loss. Hogarth Press and Institute of Psycho-Analysis.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W., Sklair, F., Harris, T. O. & Birley, J. L. T. (1973a) Life events and psychiatric disorder: 1. Some methodological issues. Psychological Medicine, 3, 74–87.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, G. W., Harris, T. O. & Peto, J. (1973b) Life events and psychiatric disorder: 2. Nature of causal link. Psychological Medicine, 3, 159–76.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W. (1974) Meaning, measurement and stress of life-events. In Stressful Life-events: Their Nature and Effects (eds Dohrenwend, B. S. and Dohrenwend, B. P.). New York: John Wiley and Sons Inc.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W., Bhrolcháin, M. N. & Harris, T. (1975) Social class and psychiatric disturbance among women in an urban population. Sociology, 9, 225–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carney, M. W. P., Roth, M. & Garside, R. F. (1965) The diagnosis of depressive syndromes and the prediction of ECT response. British Journal of Psychiatry, 111, 659–74.Google Scholar
Edelston, H. (1943) Separation anxiety in young children: A study of hospital cases. Genetic Psychology Monograph, 28, 3–95.Google Scholar
Engel, G. L. (1967) A psychological setting of somatic disease: The giving-up, given up complex. Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 60, 553–5.Google ScholarPubMed
Fairbairn, W. R. D. (1941) A revised psychopathology of the psychoses and psychoneuroses. Psycho-Analytic Studies of the Personality. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Forrest, A. D., Fraser, R. H. & Priest, R. G. (1965) Environmental factors in depressive illness. British Journal of Psychiatry, 111, 243–53.Google Scholar
Freud, S. (1917) Mourning and melancholia. In The Standard Edition, vol 19 (ed. Strachey, J.). London: Hogarth Press.Google Scholar
Goldthorpe, J. H. & Hope, K. (1974) The Social Grading of Occupations—a New Approach and Scale. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Granville-Grossman, K. L. (1968) The early environment of affective disorder. In Recent Developments in Affective Disorders (eds Coppen, A. and Walk, A.). London: Headley Brothers.Google Scholar
Hare, E. H. (1974) The changing content of psychiatric illness. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 18, 283–9.Google Scholar
Kendell, R. E. (1968) The Classification of Depressive Illness. Institute of Psychiatry Monographs, No. 18. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kiloh, L. G. & Garside, R. F. (1963) The independence of neurotic depression and endogenous depression. British Journal of Psychiatry, 109, 451–63.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Leff, M. J., Roatch, J. F. & Bunney, W. E. (1970) Environmental factors preceding the onset of severe depressions. Psychiatry, 33, 293–311.Google Scholar
Lichtenberg, P. (1957) A definition and analysis of depression. AMA Archives of Neurology and Psychiatry, 77, 519–27.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lewis, A. J. (1934) Melancholia: a clinical survey of depressive states. Journal of Mental Science, 80, 277–378.Google Scholar
Mapother, E. (1926) Opening paper of discussion on manic-depressive psychosis. British Medical Journal, ii, 875–8.Google Scholar
Marris, P. (1974) Loss and Change. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Munro, A. (1966) Parental deprivation in depressive patients. British Journal of Psychiatry, 112, 443–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parkes, C. M. (1964) Recent bereavement as a cause of mental illness. British Journal of Psychiatry, 110, 198–204.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S. (1971) Classification of depressed patients: a cluster analysis derived grouping. British Journal of Psychiatry, 118, 275–88.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Paykel, E. S. (1974) Recent-life events and clinical depression. In Life Stress and Illness (eds Gunderson, E. K. E. and Rahe, R. H.). Thomas.Google Scholar
Paykel, E. S., Klerman, G. L. & Prusoff, B. A. (1970) Treatment setting and clinical depression. Archives of General Psychiatry, 22, 11–21.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Perris, C. A. (1966) A study of bipolar (manic-depressive) and unipolar recurrent depressive psychoses. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 42, 1–189.Google Scholar
Sachar, E. J., Mackenzie, J. M., Binstock, W. A. & Mack, J. E. (1968) Corticosteroid responses to the psychotherapy of reactive depressions. Psychosomatic Medicine, 30, 23–44.Google Scholar
Seligman, M. E. P. (1975) Helplessness. In On Depression, Development and Death. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman.Google Scholar
Sethi, B. B. (1964) Relationship of separation to depression. Archives of General Psychiatry, 10, 486–96.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Spicer, C. C., Hare, E. H. & Slater, E. (1973) Neurotic and psychotic forms of depressive illness: evidence from age-incidence in a national sample. British Journal of Psychiatry, 123, 535–41.Google Scholar
Taylor, Lord & Chave, S. (1964) Mental Health and Environment. London: Longmans.Google Scholar
Wilson, I. C., Alltop, L. & Buffaloe, W. J. (1967) Parental bereavement in childhood: MMPI profiles in a depressed population. British Journal of Psychiatry, 113, 761–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winokur, G., Clayton, P. J. & Reich, T. (1969) Manic Depressive Illness. C. V. Mosby Company.Google Scholar
Wing, J. K., Cooper, J. E. & Sartorius, N. (1974) The Measurement and Classification of Schizophrenic Symptoms: an Instruction Manual for the Present State Examination and CATEGO Programme. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.