Personality differences between patients with major depression and bipolar disorder--the impact of minor symptoms on self-ratings of personality.

The study explores whether minor symptoms of patients in recovery from a mood disorder have an impact on self-ratings of personality with special consideration of potential differences between diagnostic groups. 90 recovered DSM-III-R major unipolar depressives and 167 recovered bipolars were compared with respect to scale values of the Munich Personality Test (MPT). Major depressives showed significantly higher scores on the MPT scales Rigidity and Orientation towards Social Norms, and lower scores on Extraversion than the bipolar patients. Using a LISREL-model, psychopathology was found to have a significant impact on Neuroticism and Extraversion, but not on Rigidity and on Orientation towards Social Norms. Controlling for symptomatology, the differences in the MPT scale values of the two diagnostic groups remained significant and can hardly be sufficiently explained by residual symptomatology.