The Causative Role of Stress in Depression: Gender Differences

Introduction
Since the 1960's there has been a large volume of systematic research on the role of life events in psychiatric disorder. The life event literature now clearly indicates that the risk of depression is considerably increased following stressful life events. Type of life event is only weakly related to type of disorder. Those events, which are more generally stressful, are also more likely to produce disorder. Some disorders are more strongly associated with life events than others. Depression is one of these, with the possible exception o bipolar disorder [1].
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