A comparison of social-skills training, pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy for depression
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TL;DR
The SST + Placebo groups had greater improvement on measures of social skill, and were more similar to the normal women after treatment, than the Amitriptyline and Psychotherapy + placebo groups.
Abstract
This study compared four treatments for unipolar (non-psychotic) depression: Amitriptyline, Social-Skills Training (SST) + Amitriptyline, SST + Placebo and Psychotherapy + Placebo. In addition, 25 normal women were assessed on the behavioral measures in order to evaluate the ecological validity of the dependent measures and the changes produced by treatment. The four treatments, conducted by experienced clinicians, all produced statistically-significant and clinically-meaningful changes in symptomatology. However, there were several notable differences. The SST groups had greater improvement on measures of social skill, and were more similar to the normal women after treatment. In addition the SST + Placebo group had the lowest level of attrition and had the highest proportion of patients who were significantly improved. Significance of the results for future research on SST and role-play measures of social skill was discussed.