Parental Bonding and Depressive Disorders in Adolescents

Abstract
The present exploratory study was designed 10 determine whether a sample of depressed adolescents differed from demographically similar samples of normal and non-depressed psychiatric controls as a function of their perceived patterns of parental bonding. All research participants were recruited from the general population Diagnosis were based on a structured diagnostic interview, keyed to DSM-III criteria. Parental bonding was assessed using the Parental Bonding Instrument PHI; Parker, C. Tupling, H. & Brown, L. B. (1979). A parental bonding instrument. British Journal of Medical Psychology, 52, 1–10. The results of this study suggest that parental bonding plays an important but non-specific role in the occurrence of adolescent psychopathology.