Journal of Personality and Social Psycholology, 1992 Feb;62(2):273-80

Cluster analysis of depressed college students' social behaviors.*

Hokanson JE, Butler AC
Department of Psychology, Florida State University, Tallahassee 32306-1051.

Measures of interpersonal behaviors exhibited by depressed college students toward their dormitory roommates were cluster analyzed, and this procedure produced 2 relatively distinct subgroups: a dependent, friendly, overgenerous type and an autocratic, competitive, aggressive, mistrustful type. These 2 groups were studied over a 9-month period; findings revealed that behaviors associated with each cluster were relatively stable and unrelated to gender or initial symptom severity. In longitudinal analyses, depressives in one group showed symptom abatement across time, whereas symptoms of the other group remained elevated. The roommates of depressives exhibited relatively high levels of hostility and a progressive decline in social contact and satisfaction with their depressed cohabitant. The results are discussed in relation to other typological approaches to unipolar depression.

* Reproduced with permission of the APA - Journal of Personality and Social Psychology