The capacity of anticipation is fundamentally disturbed in depressed patients. These patients make negative predictions. Anticipation disturbances are reflected in different symptoms but also in the patient's cognitions. The cognitive approach is an operational way to deal with the concept of anticipation. The cognitive model of depression has been extensively studied and cognitive therapies have been validated as effective treatments of depression. A self-questionnaire has been elaborated, taking into account the different cognitive mechanisms disturbed in depressed patients. The "Anticipatory Cognitions Questionnaire" (ACQ) explores patient's cognitions in concrete daily life situations that require anticipation. The first version of this questionnaire contained 18 items. A previous study had led to reduce the number of items and to modify the form of the questionnaire. In its final version, the ACQ has 8 items. Each of them refers to a concrete situation (i.e. "I have no news from a loved one") and the patient is asked to say how a proposed cognition (i.e. "I will call him to get in touch") applies to him, choosing one of the four answers "true", "rather true", "rather wrong" and "wrong". The validation of this questionnaire has been carried out, in comparison with the MADRS and Pichot's QD2A. 151 subjects were included in this validation study, 72% of them meeting with the DSM III-R diagnostic criteria of clinical depression and 28% not having any psychiatric disorder. Statistical analysis shows that the ACQ is more sensible than the QD2A but less than the MADRS.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)