This Article  • References  • Full text PDF  • Reply to article  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citation map  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Joseph Shepsel Silverman, MD; Julia Ann Silverman; David A. Eardley, DEd

Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1984;41(1):28-30.

Abstract
• The Dysfunctional Attitude Scale (DAS) is an inventory of beliefs about life. These beliefs attribute happiness to external events and reflect absolute expectations for one's own behavior and that of others. Such beliefs, according to some cognitive theorists, predispose persons to depression. To test this theory, we administered the DAS to private psychiatric outpatients. Thirty-five patients were tested when they were depressed and again when they were asymptomatic. Dysfunctional thinking was found to be more prominent during depression; this finding implies that the dysfunctional thinking of depressed persons is a symptom of their illness rather than a character trait. Next, we compared DAS scores for recovered depressives with scores for other stabilized psychiatric patients and for normal persons. Bipolar patients demonstrated less maladaptive thinking than all other groups. Only the bipolars showed significantly less maladaptive thinking than the major depressives.

Author Affiliations
From the Departments of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and The Altoona (Pa) Hospital; and the Department of Family Practice, Milton S. Hershey School of Medicine, Hershey, Pa (Dr Silverman). Ms Silverman is a student at Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Dr Eardley is a school psychologist with the Appalachia Intermediate Unit 08, Hollidaysburg, Pa.

Footnotes
Accepted for publication March 7, 1983.

Reprint requests to 501 Howard Ave, Altoona, PA 16601 (Dr Silverman).

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Cognitive Reactivity to Sad Mood Provocation and the Prediction of Depressive Relapse.
Segal et al.
Arch Gen Psychiatry 2006;63:749-755.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT  

Self-Referent Versus Other-Referent Information Processing in Dysphoric, Clinically Depressed, and Remitted Depressed Subjects
Moretti et al.
Pers Soc Psychol Bull 1996;22:68-80.
ABSTRACT  

Cognitive Styles and Proneness to Depressive Symptoms in University Women
Zemore and Veikle
Pers Soc Psychol Bull 1989;15:426-438.
ABSTRACT  

Diagnostic Criteria for Melancholia: The Comparative Validity of DSM-III and DSM-III-R
Zimmerman et al.
Arch Gen Psychiatry 1989;46:361-368.
ABSTRACT  

Attributional Patterns in Depression and Euthymia
Sackeim and Wegner
Arch Gen Psychiatry 1986;43:553-560.
ABSTRACT  

The Validity of the Dexamethasone Suppression Test as a Marker for Endogenous Depression
Zimmerman et al.
Arch Gen Psychiatry 1986;43:347-355.
ABSTRACT  

The Validity of Four Definitions of Endogenous Depression: II. Clinical, Demographic, Familial, and Psychosocial Correlates
Zimmerman et al.
Arch Gen Psychiatry 1986;43:234-244.
ABSTRACT  

Do Maladaptive Attitudes 'Cause' Depression: Misconception of Cognitive Theory
Riskind
Arch Gen Psychiatry 1984;41:1111-1112.
ABSTRACT