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Some Familial and Social Factors in Depressive Illness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Alistair Munro*
Affiliation:
University of Leeds, Formerly a member of the Scientific Staff, Medical Research Council Unit for Research on the Epidemiology of Psychiatric Illness, University of Edinburgh

Extract

This article presents the results of a study in which a number of social, familial and demographic aspects of primary depressive illness were examined under carefully-controlled conditions. The following factors are particularly considered:

  1. 1. The size of the sibship in the depressive's family of upbringing;

  2. 2. the ordinal position of the depressive in that sibship;

  3. 3. the depressive's position in the sibship relative to the other sibs;

  4. 4. the age of the parents at the time of the depressive individual's birth;

  5. 5. the presence of a family history of severe mental illness;

  6. 6. celibacy and marriage in depressive individuals;

  7. 7. the fertility of depressives;

  8. 8. the social class distribution of depressive illness.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1966 

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