How common are common mental disorders? Evidence that lifetime prevalence rates are doubled by prospective versus retrospective ascertainment.

Loading...
Thumbnail Image

Date

2010-06

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Repository Usage Stats

373
views
1248
downloads

Citation Stats

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Most information about the lifetime prevalence of mental disorders comes from retrospective surveys, but how much these surveys have undercounted due to recall failure is unknown. We compared results from a prospective study with those from retrospective studies. METHOD: The representative 1972-1973 Dunedin New Zealand birth cohort (n=1037) was followed to age 32 years with 96% retention, and compared to the national New Zealand Mental Health Survey (NZMHS) and two US National Comorbidity Surveys (NCS and NCS-R). Measures were research diagnoses of anxiety, depression, alcohol dependence and cannabis dependence from ages 18 to 32 years. RESULTS: The prevalence of lifetime disorder to age 32 was approximately doubled in prospective as compared to retrospective data for all four disorder types. Moreover, across disorders, prospective measurement yielded a mean past-year-to-lifetime ratio of 38% whereas retrospective measurement yielded higher mean past-year-to-lifetime ratios of 57% (NZMHS, NCS-R) and 65% (NCS). CONCLUSIONS: Prospective longitudinal studies complement retrospective surveys by providing unique information about lifetime prevalence. The experience of at least one episode of DSM-defined disorder during a lifetime may be far more common in the population than previously thought. Research should ask what this means for etiological theory, construct validity of the DSM approach, public perception of stigma, estimates of the burden of disease and public health policy.

Department

Description

Provenance

Citation

Published Version (Please cite this version)

10.1017/S0033291709991036

Publication Info

Moffitt, TE, A Caspi, A Taylor, J Kokaua, BJ Milne, G Polanczyk and R Poulton (2010). How common are common mental disorders? Evidence that lifetime prevalence rates are doubled by prospective versus retrospective ascertainment. Psychol Med, 40(6). pp. 899–909. 10.1017/S0033291709991036 Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/3976.

This is constructed from limited available data and may be imprecise. To cite this article, please review & use the official citation provided by the journal.

Scholars@Duke

Moffitt

Terrie E. Moffitt

Nannerl O. Keohane University Distinguished Professor

Terrie E. Moffitt, Ph.D., is the Nannerl O. Keohane University Professor of Psychology at Duke University, and Professor of Social Development at King’s College London. Her expertise is in the areas of longitudinal methods, developmental theory, mental disorders and antisocial behaviors, neuropsychology, and genomics in behavioral science. She is currently uncovering the consequences of a lifetime of mental and behavioral disorder on processes of aging. She is the Associate Director of the Dunedin Longitudinal Study, which follows a 1972 birth cohort in New Zealand. She also co-founded the Environmental Risk Longitudinal Twin Study (E-Risk), which follows a 1994 birth cohort in the UK. Dr. Moffitt also is a licensed clinical psychologist, with specialization in neuropsychological assessment. She collaborates with criminologists, economists, geneticists, epidemiologists, sociologists, demographers, gerontologists, statisticians, neuroscientists, medical scientists, opthalmologists, and dentists. Dr. Moffitt is a fellow of the National Academy of Medicine and  the American Academy of Arts and Sciences , as well as the British Academy, Academy of Medical Sciences (UK), Academia Europa, Association of Psychological Science, and the American Society of Criminology. She holds honorary doctorates from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, and Universitat Basel, Switzerland. For her research, Dr. Moffitt has received both the American Psychological Association's Early Career Contribution Award and Distinguished Career Award. Dr. Moffitt was also awarded a Royal Society-Wolfson Merit Award, the Klaus-Grawe Prize, and was a recipient of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology, NARSAD Ruane Prize, the Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize, and in 2022 the Grawemeyer Prize. Her service includes serving as chair of the Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Science at NASEM, Chair of the NIA Data Monitoring Committee for the Health and Retirement Study, and Chair of the Jury for the Klaus J. Jacobs Prize in Switzerland. Dr. Moffitt attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for her undergraduate degree in psychology. She continued her training in psychology at the University of Southern California, receiving an M.A. in experimental animal behavior, and a Ph.D. in clinical psychology. She also completed postdoctoral training in geriatrics and neuropsychology at the University of California Los Angeles Neuropsychiatric Institute. In her spare time, she works on her poison-ivy farm in North Carolina.

Caspi

Avshalom Caspi

Edward M. Arnett Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience

Caspi’s research is concerned with three questions: (1) How do childhood experiences shape aging and the course of health inequalities across the life span?  (2) How do genetic differences between people shape the way they respond to their environments? (3) How do mental health problems unfold across and shape the life course? 


Unless otherwise indicated, scholarly articles published by Duke faculty members are made available here with a CC-BY-NC (Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial) license, as enabled by the Duke Open Access Policy. If you wish to use the materials in ways not already permitted under CC-BY-NC, please consult the copyright owner. Other materials are made available here through the author’s grant of a non-exclusive license to make their work openly accessible.