Neuropsychological changes in melancholic and atypical depression: A systematic review

•Depressive subtype is an important factor influencing neuropsychological performance.•Different depressive subtype classification criteria may affect the outcome of cognitive assessments.•MEL patients have poorer performance than NMEL on verbal and visual memory, executive function, sustained attention, span and psychomotor speed.•Verbal fluency and psychomotor speed tasks differentiate atypical depression from melancholic subtype since MEL patients performed worst.•Compared to HC, MEL and atypical patients were impaired in several functions. But MEL patients show more extensive and greater impairments.