A comparison of self-reported versus clinician-related symptoms in depression.

Self-reported and clinician-rated symptom-severity measures were administered to 19 patients with unipolar endogenous major depression, 24 patients with unipolar nonendogenous major depression, and 14 patients with dysthymic disorder. Both the dysthymic and the nonendogenous major depressive groups self-reported significantly (p less than .05) more symptoms than were recorded by clinicians, and the endogenously depressed group evidenced no significant (p = .83) discrepancy between self-rated and clinician-rated measures. The data are consistent with the idea that a negative thinking bias may in here particularly in the dysthymic and the nonendogenous depressed groups.