[Visual evoked potentials and attention processes in depression]

The study of the attention process during depression has been realized with the recording of visual evoked potential (VEP) by simple pattern reversal checkerboard and in sequences where a rare stimulus appears randomly, with or without task. The recordings obtained on fifty patients have been compared to the VEP obtained on fifteen reference subjects. The results indicate that some perturbations, characteristic of the depressive state, should happen at the both levels of attentional selection, early (P1 and N1 components) and late (P3 component). The responses of the depressive patients appear to reflect rather an intervention of automatic attention process.