Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been categorized as “Depression”
How do you address stigma about depression? Depression is an illness, and it’s an illness that’s not easy to cope with. But in addition to the illness itself and how awful it makes you feel some days, you also have to deal with people – from the closest family to the most casual stranger – judging you for not being …
How do you make decisions? Major depression can have profound effects on decision making, causing apparently irrational decisions, for example, not choosing to change behavior in ways that will likely lead to rewards, and choosing instead a course of action that is likely to be unrewarding. Traditional psychological theories of depression have focused on the notion that the problem is …
Women who are pregnant, especially if it is a first child, are usually extremely protective of the child, so much so that it can sometimes be hard to convince the mother-to-be that taking care of her need for emotional stability is as important as protecting the child from risk. This makes it hard to explain the potential value of continuing …
Heredity and childhood trauma are two known risk factors for depression, but these can’t be modified in adults. Are there specific actions that could be taken by at-risk individuals that would make depression prevention possible? Much of the research available so far does not search for a wide variety of possible factors, instead focusing on a hypothesized intervention, e.g. exercise …
After decades of increasing life expectancy, recent years have seen a higher death rate among some groups of Americans, attributed to increases in suicide and drug and alcohol abuse. The causes of these so-called “deaths of despair” are still debated, but may include job loss, economic downgrading, and lack of safety net programs, such as job retraining. A recent study …
MoodSurfing advocates identifying strategies for managing moods without medications, not because we think medications are bad, but because they do have potential adverse effects. We think that some of these strategies are very helpful, but the psychiatric establishment has not always agreed. A recent study1 provides evidence that choosing activities to stabilize mood can have a big impact on mental …
Are you supposed to be happy? Depression can be a really depressing thing to talk about and often we are told not to bring up “depressing” topics in conversation, even with close friends and family members. People struggling with depression are expected to put on a cheerful mask and not spread their sadness around to others. How can we learn …
Depression, particularly recurrent depression, has pretty significant effects on how we perceive the world and how well we make plans for the future. In an article published in Biological Psychiatry in March 2020, Tobias Kube and co-authors develop a model of how depression affects critical cognitive processes that expands and extends the traditional model of cognitive changes associated with depression …
Passive tracking of vocal and behavioral indicators of symptoms via a smartphone app can be an effective way to improve depression in a time-sensitive and accurate fashion. A recent randomized clinical trial compared the use of an app to track indicators with “usual” care for depression, and, although the sample size is small, the results are very promising. For the …
Dr. Jed Diamond has a website called Men Alive that looks at men’s health in new ways. Depression, stress management, anger and love are all life experiences that play out very differently for men and for women. Yet depression, in particular is often viewed as a “women’s” problem, and notably more than twice as many women as men are diagnosed …
Interventions to reduce maternal depressive symptoms, especially during infancy may have lasting effects on child neurological development. A longitudinal study recently published in the Netherlands has found that children whose mothers exhibited depressive symptoms during their infancy have measurable reductions in brain size even by age 10. These findings provide evidence for an observed link between maternal depression and ADHD …
“What’s the use”. “It won’t work anyway”. Do you find yourself thinking hopelessly and helplessly about your own situation, unable to find any constructive steps to take to move forward? Learned helplessness is what psychologists call it when a patient believes strongly that no action they can possibly take will make their situation better. It’s the “dark side” – or …
Moodsurfing has reported on several studies and programs in the past that attempt to use smartphone data to improve mental health. Now, an AP report from early January updates some of this research. Smartphone users generate a huge amount of data, which, if correctly analyzed, could provide life saving information about early onset of depression, warning signs for a manic …
2016 data now available from the Center for Disease Control show that suicide is now a leading cause of death for adults aged 25 – 44, at 16.9 deaths per 100,000, it exceeds the rate of death from heart disease in this age cohort. For those aged 15 – 24, suicide is now the second highest cause of death. It …
Here’s a list of 80 fun or pleasurable things to do. Some of them are simple to arrange and quick to accomplish, and some require some planning and preparation, or even money. But all of them can be enjoyable experiences. Remember that motivation is less important than just doing it. Even if you don’t feel like it, or don’t think …
Seems like recognizing depression ought to be easy, and that it’s so widespread that it can hardly be hidden, but the reality is that many people with major clinical depression are not diagnosed, or are given insufficient treatment to address the realities of their situation. Major depression is defined as an episode in which for at least two weeks one …
An interesting opinion piece in the New York Times this past week highlights unintended consequences of the ways in which we talk about mental illness and the strategies we use to reduce stigma around it. Dr. Lisa Pryor, a mental health care practitioner in Australia comments that increasing discussion, publicity and stigma reduction around “moderate” mental illnesses like anxiety and …
Sometimes people feel that it is time to end it all because they have become too old without having achieved a dream, or because they are no longer attractive. It seems to me that these feelings may have been behind Ms Kate Spade’s recent death. Everyone faces disappointments. And as we age we have to deal with more of them. …
Is depression increasing? Major depression diagnoses have risen by as much as 33% according to a report by insurer Blue Cross Blue Shield. These numbers may be under-reports since they do not include the uninsured, and even among insured people there is significant under-diagnosis. Particularly concerning is the rise in depression among adolescents and young adults. Rates have increased as much …
Exercise is good for depression, but what kind of exercise is better and how well does it work, is resistance training better than aerobic exercise? The prestigious journal JAMA Psychiatry has published a lengthy meta-analysis of 33 studies looking into the effectiveness of resistance training (RET) in reducing depressive symptoms. RET includes exercises such as weight training, push ups, etc., …
