The Perceived Aversiveness of Death Related Events in Depressed and Non-Depressed Individuals

Abstract

It was hypothesized that depressives would rate death related events as more aversive than appropriate control groups. Ratings of aversiveness (3-point scale) were obtained from depressed patients (N=61), from “MMPI-Hi” (N=66), “normal” (N=75) control groups for six death related events (e.g., attending a funeral) and for six control events (e.g., having someone I love leave me). Results were analyzed with analysis of covariance with age and sex as covariates. Death related events occurred with low frequency in all groups. There was a significant tendency for the depressives to rate all events as more aversive than the control groups (p < .01). The differences between the aversiveness ratings of the death related and control items for the depressed was small and not significant. The results indicate that death related events do not have a special valence for depressed individuals. Rather, depressives manifest a general tendency towards evaluating, and perhaps experiencing, potential unpleasant events as more aversive.