Dysfunctional Attitudes and 5-HT2 Receptors During Depression and Self-Harm

To investigate whether a low level of 5-HT agonism could account for the higher levels of dysfunctional attitudes observed in patients with major depression or with self-injurious behaviour, cortex 5-HT2 receptor binding potential & dysfunctional attitudes were measured in patients with major depressive disorder, patients with a history of self-injurious behaviour, & healthy comparison subjects. Based on their findings, the authors re-interpret the results of postmortem investigations of suicide victims which have reported higher 5-HT2 receptor density in Brodmann’s area 9. (76 refs)