Depressive personality: Reliability, validity, and relation to dysthymia.

The reliability and validity of K. Schneider's (1958) construct of depressive personality was evaluated in a sample of 177 outpatients, who were administered structured diagnostic and family history interviews, an extensive battery of inventories, and a 6-mo follow-up assessment. The criteria for depressive personality had moderate to good interrater reliability, internal consistency, and test–retest stability, and the assessment of depressive personality traits was not influenced by patients' clinical states. In addition, preliminary support for the convergent and discriminant validity of the depressive personality construct was obtained. Although there were significant relations between the depressive personality and diagnoses of dysthymia from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III) and DSM-III—Revised (DSM-III—R), the depressive personality was not entirely subsumed by existing mood disorders. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)