To the Editor.—
In an article reporting the reliability and validity of a new self-report form for the assessment of manic and depressive symptoms, Bauer et al1 suggest that the "core" characteristics of the manic syndrome are variables relating to activation level but not to mood state. Their 17-item scale using a visual analogue format was given to manic and depressed patients and normal controls who were not psychiatrically or medically ill and who had the same age, race, gender, and educational characteristics as patients. Socioeconomic level and employment status were not controlled. Using factor analytic techniques, they found that a factor related to "well-being" was separable from factors of "activation" and "perceived conflict." These factors were transformed into subscales and the three groups were compared.Because the Well-Being subscale did not differentiate the manic patients from the controls and the Perceived Conflict subscale did not differentiate the manic patients