ArticleMolecular psychiatry2018
A direct test of the diathesis-stress model for depression.
Article in Molecular psychiatry, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 138 papers, 7 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
138 citing papers in PubMed, 7 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 286 citations in OpenAlex.
- The predictive value of polygenic risk scores for depression in gene-environment interaction studies: a systematic review.Translational psychiatry · 2026Pooled it
- Sex-stratified genome-wide association meta-analysis of major depressive disorder.Nature communications · 2025Pooled it
- Neurobiological insights into the effects of ultra-processed food on lipid metabolism and associated mental health conditions: a scoping review.Frontiers in nutrition · 2025Pooled it
- Genetics, epigenetics, and neurobiology of childhood-onset depression: an umbrella review.Molecular psychiatry · 2024Pooled it
- The association between self-reported stress and cardiovascular measures in daily life: A systematic review.PloS one · 2021Pooled it
- Prevalence of posttraumatic and general psychological stress during COVID-19: A rapid review and meta-analysis.Psychiatry research · 2020Pooled it
- Genome-wide interaction study of a proxy for stress-sensitivity and its prediction of major depressive disorder.PloS one · 2018Pooled it
- History of childhood trauma enhances the detrimental effects of recent stressors on brain structure and function in major depressive disorder.Journal of neural transmission (Vienna, Austria : 1996) · 2026Article
- Global and regional burden of major depressive disorder and associated risk factors: analysis from the Global Burden of disease study, 1990-2021.European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience · 2026Article
- Illuminating the complex interplay of risk factors for depression symptoms within a large-scale US longitudinal cohort.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2026Article
- Cross-ancestry genetic architecture reveals shared biological pathways of major psychiatric disorders.Molecular psychiatry · 2026Article
- The Relationship Between Negative Life Events and Internalizing Problems: The Mediating Role of Self-Esteem and the Moderating Role of Resilience.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Methylome-Wide Association Studies of Physical Injury Stratified by Depression Status Assesses Exposure by Diagnosis Effects in Oxytocin Signaling and Synaptic Plasticity.Biological psychiatry global open science · 2026Article
- Mental health literacy profiles and associated factors among young Chinese male soldiers: a latent profile analysis.BMC psychiatry · 2026Article
- Stress-diathesis based predictors of depression and anxiety trajectories in adolescence: a population-based longitudinal cohort study.Psychological medicine · 2026Article
- Applying machine-learning and deep-learning to predict depression from brain MRI and identify depression-related brain biology.Translational psychiatry · 2026Article
- Nutrition in early life interacts with genetic risk to influence preadult behaviour in the Raine Study.Communications medicine · 2026Article
- Moderating the Heritability of Body Mass Index by Age and Sex With Genomic Data.Genetic epidemiology · 2026Article
- Article
- Polygenic scores in the study of gene-environment interplay and stress-related psychopathology.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2026Review
78 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
16 authors at 6 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The diathesis-stress theory for depression states that the effects of stress on the depression risk are dependent on the diathesis or vulnerability, implying multiplicative interactive effects on the liability scale. We used polygenic risk scores for major depressive disorder (MDD) calculated from the results of the most recent analysis from the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium as a direct measure of the vulnerability for depression in a sample of 5221 individuals from 3083 families. In the same we also had measures of stressful life events and social support and a depression symptom score, as well as DSM-IV MDD diagnoses for most individuals. In order to estimate the variance in depression explained by the genetic vulnerability, the stressors and their interactions, we fitted linear mixed models controlling for relatedness for the whole sample as well as stratified by sex. We show a significant interaction of the polygenic risk scores with personal life events (0.12% of variance explained, P-value=0.0076) contributing positively to the risk of depression. Additionally, our results suggest possible differences in the aetiology of depression between women and men. In conclusion, our findings point to an extra risk for individuals with combined vulnerability and high number of reported personal life events beyond what would be expected from the additive contributions of these factors to the liability for depression, supporting the multiplicative diathesis-stress model for this disease.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.