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Underlying personality characteristics influence the presentation of depressive symptomatology in clinical settings (see, e.g., Luyten and Blatt 2007). Depression may appear differently across individuals depending on a person's specific constellation of defense mechanisms and personality traits (Mullen et al. 1999). While the relationship between personality and depression has been studied in cross-sectional (Bloch et al. 1993) and short-term longitudinal studies, no research to date has examined prospectively coded life span trajectories of depression in relation to personality functioning. A life span developmental approach may clarify whether personality characteristics are related not only to the presence of depression but also to the way depression unfolds in an individual across time.
The present study examines 75-year trajectories of depressive symptomatology in relation to personality functioning. We examine trajectories in relation to both defense mechanisms and personality traits. Participants were part of the Study of Adult Development (Vaillant 2012), which has followed a sample of 268 men from their sophomore year of college starting in 1938 until the present. At the project's outset, these men were assessed by internists, psychiatrists, psychologists, and anthropologists. Since that time, the men have completed questionnaires approximately every two years, their medical records have been obtained every five years, and they have been interviewed by study staff every ten to fifteen years. Using the data from these sources, we have coded the presence of depressive symptomatology at five-year intervals across the life span, giving us fifteen waves of dimensional data.