Abstract
Twenty-one head injured patients were administered the Sickness Impact Profile (SIP) and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) at an average post-trauma time of 5.3 years. Wechsler IQ and Memory Quotient data were available for seventeen of these patients. The MMPI data replicated the Burton and Volpe (1988) finding of a pattern of elevation in the Depression, Psychopathic deviate, and Schizophrenia (2,4,8) scales, which reflects a "distress syndrome" and may be characteristic of head trauma patients.
Correlations of the MMPI Depression score with the SIP scales and the intelligence and memory scores were performed. Relationships between depression and all of the SIP Physical Dimension scales were found, but no relationships between depression and the cognitive measures were found. The cognitive measures were Wechsler Full Scale IQ, Memory Quotient, SIP Alertness Behavior, and SIP Communication. The specific SIP Physical Dimension scales and other SIP scales that correlated with depression were Ambulation, Mobility, Body Care and Movement, Sleep and Rest, Recreation and Pastimes, Home Management, and, most strongly, Work. It is not clear whether depression resulted in impaired work performance or whether impaired work performance resulted in depression.
The numerous relationships between depression and physical disability and the absence of relationships between depression and the cognitive measures suggest that, at least in this sample, physical disability was a stronger determinant of depression than cognitive disability. Perhaps cognitive difficulties must be more severe to be associated with depression than in the present sample. Little research has been done investigating this issue, and more is clearly needed.