A survey was conducted to examine the prevalence of depressive symptomatology among residents of a rural community using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. Subjects were 220 men and 319 women aged between 30 and 69 who participated in annual community health examinations. The relation of depressive symptomatology to the results of physical examination, self-rated health status, subjective symptoms and lifestyles were also examined. The results are as follows. 1) Of the subjects, 13.2% of the men and 16.3% of the women had depressive symptomatology (CES-D score > or = 16), with 4.5% of the men and 9.4% of the women having moderate or severe depressive symptomatology (CES-D score > or = 20). Prevalence was higher for younger men and for women in their forties, but these differences were not statistically significant. 2) There was a weak correlation between depressive symptomatology and the results of physical examination. Self-rated health status was more significantly correlated with depressive symptomatology. Self-rated health status and depressive symptomatology each correlated independently with the number of symptoms experienced by the subjects over the past year. The subjective symptoms that were correlated with depressive symptomatology were different from those correlated to self-rated health status. Men and women also had differences in links between depressive symptomatology, self-rated health status and symptoms experienced. 3) Lifestyles of those who had depressive symptomatology were worse than those who did not. But only duration of sleep and food intake had statistically significant relation to depressive symptomatology. Only weak correlations between lifestyles and self-rated health status were observed.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)