Relationship of Anxiety and Depression to Age and Sex in an Acute Psychiatric Population

Abstract

This study was designed to assess the relationship of anxiety and depression to age and sex for an acute psychiatric inpatient population. The measures used were the Depression scale of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) and the Taylor Scale of Manifest Anxiety. Eight age-sex subgroups of 50 subjects each were formed. Subgroup means decreased significantly with increasing age on the Taylor scale but not on the Depression scale. Women showed significantly higher scores than men on both scales, but the differences were significant only for the youngest age range. Men showed a significant increase in depression scale scores with age; women did not. The correlation between the two scales was .55 for women and .53 for men. The relationships of anxiety and depression to age and sex in this psychiatric population are quite similar to those found in many community survey studies. The distributions are simply shifted upward.