Am J Psychiatry 1983; 140:473-476
Copyright © 1983 by American Psychiatric Association
The role of social support in the functioning of patients with unipolar depression
JA Flaherty, FM Gaviria, EM Black, E Altman and T Mitchell
The authors studied 44 outpatients with unipolar depression to determine
the association among social support systems, life events, social
adjustment, and depressive symptoms. Social support had a reasonably high
correlation with outcome measures. Patients with high social support had
significantly better scores than those with low social support on the
Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression and the Social Adjustment Rating Scale
Self-Report. These data corroborate the hypothesis that social support
systems play a critical role in the ongoing functioning of a defined group
of depressed patients.
