Reactivity to incoming stimuli and the experience of life-events

In 60 patients, hospitalized for a depressive syndrome, visual average evoked potentials (V .AEP) to stimuli of different intensities and the occurrence of life-events during the last year, as assessed by means of a specially constructed questionnaire, were investigated. Patients with an augmenter response in V .AEP, i.e. a tendency to react with increasing maximum amplitude of the evoked potential when stimulus intensity is increased, were found to report more life-events, to report more life-events as extremely difficult, and to report adaptation after the life-event as difficult. Thus it seems clear that it is not only of importance to investigate the number and characteristics of life-events that occurred, but also to bring attention to the perceptual reactance of the person experiencing the event.