Gender differences in depression
2000/12/01 by Marco Piccinelli, Greg Wilkinson · 2,385 citations
Medicine · Psychology · #Anxiety #Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development #Clinical psychology #Coping (psychology) #Depression (economics) #Developmental psychology #Etiology #Mental Health Treatment and Access #Psychiatry #Psychology #Sex and Gender in Healthcare #Sociocultural evolution #Vulnerability (computing)
paper · pdf · doi:10.1192/bjp.177.6.486
published in The British Journal of Psychiatry 177(6), 486-492 (Cambridge University Press)
openalex publication_date 2000/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract
BACKGROUND: With few exceptions, the prevalence, incidence and morbidity risk of depressive disorders are higher in females than in males, beginning at mid-puberty and persisting through adult life. AIMS: To review putative risk factors leading to gender differences in depressive disorders. METHOD: A critical review of the literature, dealing separately with artefactual and genuine determinants of gender differences in depressive disorders. RESULTS: Although artefactual determinants may enhance a female preponderance to some extent, gender differences in depressive disorders are genuine. At present, adverse experiences in childhood, depression and anxiety disorders in childhood and adolescence, sociocultural roles with related adverse experiences, and psychological attributes related to vulnerability to life events and coping skills are likely to be involved. Genetic and biological factors and poor social support, however, have few or no effects in the emergence of gender differences. CONCLUSIONS: Determinants of gender differences in depressive disorders are far from being established and their combination into integrated aetiological models continues to be lacking.
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