4 ms·

(2019) The article seems to articulate that happiness is the opposite of depression and that unhappiness is synonymous with depression. That could be arguably

(2019) The article seems to articulate that happiness is the opposite of depression and that unhappiness is synonymous with depression. That could be arguably a thing in a purely rhetorical sense but is absolutely incorrect in a clinical sense. Clinically speaking depression is the multi symptom result of one or more chemical imbalances in the brain resulting in arrhythmic emotional states. The opposite of depression from a clinical perspective is emotional balance. This is why treating specifically the symptoms of depression often results in relapses at later times.

claudiawerner 7y ago
Mark Fisher addresses a component of the chemical imbalance theory, and why it doesn't go far enough: >This commodification lay in the so-called ‘bio-chemicalization’ of depression. This is the assertion that depression is caused primarily by biochemical imbalance in the brain, namely low serotonin levels. To treat mental health illness is to treat the symptoms of a single person who ‘owns’ their illness. Depression is internalised and individuated. As such, we lose a sense of collective responsibility for mental health illness in terms of causation, understanding and treatment. >This is not to dispute that depression is not neurologically verifiable. Rather, it is to dispute that the neurological disposition of depressed people is caused only by internal, biochemical factors. If, like Fisher, we ask: ‘What causes low serotonin levels?’ we are forced to comprehend mental health illness as a culturally contingent phenomena caused by a conjuncture of biochemical and societal factors. From: https://thepanoptic.co.uk/2017/08/06/repoliticising-depression-late-mark-fishers-vital-lesson/ https://thepanoptic.co.uk/2017/08/06/repoliticising-depressi... >This is a crucial question. The way in which social and political problems are converted into individual pathologies, to be explained via chemical imbalances or family history, neatly sums up so much of what has happened under capitalist realism. It’s what I’ve called the privatisation of stress. Depression has been described as a pathology of responsibility: you feel intensely responsible for the state that you’re in. The excruciating paradox is that, while you feel that only you can get yourself out of depression, the condition consists precisely in your inability to act. There’s more than an analogy with the political hopelessness and fatalism that have characterised capitalist realism. From: https://theoccupiedtimes.org/?p=3454 https://theoccupiedtimes.org/?p=3454 You can actually see just how much scrutiny the pure theory of chemical imbalance has come under from psychologists and sociologists on Google Scholar[0]. "The cause of mental disorders such as depression remains unknown. However, the idea that neurotransmitter imbalances cause depression is vigorously promoted by pharmaceutical companies and the psychiatric profession at large. We examine media reports referring to this chemical imbalance theory and ask reporters for evidence supporting their claims. We then report and critique the scientific papers and other confirming evidence offered in response to our questions. Responses were received from multiple sources, including practicing psychiatrists, clients, and a major pharmaceutical company. The evidence offered was not compelling, and several of the cited sources flatly stated that the proposed theory of serotonin imbalance was known to be incorrect. The media can play a positive role in mental health reporting by ensuring that the information reported is congruent with the peer-reviewed scientific literature." [0] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=depression+chemical+imbalance+theory&btnG=&oq=depression+chemical+ https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=depr...
- jka 7y ago
  Thanks for responding with thoughtful messages and references; I'd agree that the simplification of depression (which I have no doubt is the result of multiple, complicated factors; social, environmental, political and nutritional). It'd seem much more inline with the spirit of the HN guidelines if others could respond and critique to your messages instead of downvoting (which feels like it may be more of an attempt to suppress a message).
xfitm3 7y ago
A better definition of depression can be extrapolated from the DSM: https://www.psycom.net/depression-definition-dsm-5-diagnostic-criteria/ https://www.psycom.net/depression-definition-dsm-5-diagnosti... I want to highlight an important sentence: > To receive a diagnosis of depression, these symptoms must cause the individual clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning. The symptoms must also not be a result of substance abuse or another medical condition.
zepto 7y ago
The chemical imbalance theory is not supported by science, but is used by drug companies for marketing.
abstractbarista 7y ago
Are you sure? I thought the "chemical imbalance" story was made up by pharmaceutical companies to justify their new class of antidepressants. https://qz.com/1162154/30-years-after-prozac-arrived-we-still-buy-the-lie-that-chemical-imbalances-cause-depression/ https://qz.com/1162154/30-years-after-prozac-arrived-we-stil...
- austincheney 7y ago
  Yes, I am sure. Drugs are a medical treatment for depression but are not the only or generally preferred treatment.
  - krilly 7y ago
    Have you ever tried to seek treatment for depression? I and others I know have found it incredibly hard to get any sort of treatment other than the SSRI at the top of their list.
- kdmccormick 7y ago
  I mean, if you think about what a brain is, you could consider basically any any mental disorder is just a "chemical imbalance". Saying that depression is one isn't false, but, to your point, I think pharmaceutical companies harp on this point in order to sell antidepressants. What GP gets right, though, is that depression != sadness. It is normal (and often healthy) to feel sadness after experiencing loss or other hardships. It is not healthy to feel hopeless and devoid of energy for months on end... that's what depression is.
curuinor 7y ago
If it is a chemical imbalance only, why are there large differences in rate in different time periods in the same culture, with suicide rates hand in hand (https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/9/e023144 https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/9/e023144)? Why does the depression rate go way up during recessions and other economic phenomena (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4741013/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4741013/)? What biological-chemical thing happens during an economic recession?
- austincheney 7y ago
  Financial distress is a key catalyst associated with suicidal ideations. That doesn’t mean financially distressed people are generally suicidal or even depressed. It does mean that stresses associated with finances are a frequently identified/measured trauma that can impact depressed persons who may not be clinically diagnosed as depressed. Depression is often undiagnosed and self-managed like many other mental health diseases.
  - curuinor 7y ago
    So it's the trauma that does it? Where's the biochemical basis of trauma? I mean, when you get hit by a car and you get shock from blood loss, you die of shock from blood loss but you also die from the car. You could solve the problem with better EMT's and blood transfusions and stuff but you could also solve the problem by having better public transit and not having cars everywhere, you know?
    - austincheney 7y ago
      Wikipedia explains this better than I could: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_trauma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_trauma
starpilot 7y ago
The chemical imbalance theory is BS and dead https://qr.ae/T6UgWb https://qr.ae/T6UgWb. We don't understand depression fully, but more signs are pointing to low neurogenesis in the hippocampus. Chem imbalance may draw from medieval notions of imbalanced humors.
- austincheney 7y ago
  > Chem imbalance may draw from It draws from the preferred means of treatment for suicide survivors: controlled boredom under observation by mental health professionals in a hospital until emotional equilibrium is reestablished from the lack of external stimulus.

claudiawerner 7y ago

Mark Fisher addresses a component of the chemical imbalance theory, and why it doesn't go far enough: >This commodification lay in the so-called ‘bio-chemicalization’ of depression. This is the assertion that depression is caused primarily by biochemical imbalance in the brain, namely low serotonin levels. To treat mental health illness is to treat the symptoms of a single person who ‘owns’ their illness. Depression is internalised and individuated. As such, we lose a sense of collective responsibility for mental health illness in terms of causation, understanding and treatment. >This is not to dispute that depression is not neurologically verifiable. Rather, it is to dispute that the neurological disposition of depressed people is caused only by internal, biochemical factors. If, like Fisher, we ask: ‘What causes low serotonin levels?’ we are forced to comprehend mental health illness as a culturally contingent phenomena caused by a conjuncture of biochemical and societal factors. From: https://thepanoptic.co.uk/2017/08/06/repoliticising-depression-late-mark-fishers-vital-lesson/ https://thepanoptic.co.uk/2017/08/06/repoliticising-depressi... >This is a crucial question. The way in which social and political problems are converted into individual pathologies, to be explained via chemical imbalances or family history, neatly sums up so much of what has happened under capitalist realism. It’s what I’ve called the privatisation of stress. Depression has been described as a pathology of responsibility: you feel intensely responsible for the state that you’re in. The excruciating paradox is that, while you feel that only you can get yourself out of depression, the condition consists precisely in your inability to act. There’s more than an analogy with the political hopelessness and fatalism that have characterised capitalist realism. From: https://theoccupiedtimes.org/?p=3454 https://theoccupiedtimes.org/?p=3454 You can actually see just how much scrutiny the pure theory of chemical imbalance has come under from psychologists and sociologists on Google Scholar[0]. "The cause of mental disorders such as depression remains unknown. However, the idea that neurotransmitter imbalances cause depression is vigorously promoted by pharmaceutical companies and the psychiatric profession at large. We examine media reports referring to this chemical imbalance theory and ask reporters for evidence supporting their claims. We then report and critique the scientific papers and other confirming evidence offered in response to our questions. Responses were received from multiple sources, including practicing psychiatrists, clients, and a major pharmaceutical company. The evidence offered was not compelling, and several of the cited sources flatly stated that the proposed theory of serotonin imbalance was known to be incorrect. The media can play a positive role in mental health reporting by ensuring that the information reported is congruent with the peer-reviewed scientific literature." [0] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=depression+chemical+imbalance+theory&btnG=&oq=depression+chemical+ https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=depr...

jka 7y ago
Thanks for responding with thoughtful messages and references; I'd agree that the simplification of depression (which I have no doubt is the result of multiple, complicated factors; social, environmental, political and nutritional). It'd seem much more inline with the spirit of the HN guidelines if others could respond and critique to your messages instead of downvoting (which feels like it may be more of an attempt to suppress a message).

xfitm3 7y ago

A better definition of depression can be extrapolated from the DSM: https://www.psycom.net/depression-definition-dsm-5-diagnostic-criteria/ https://www.psycom.net/depression-definition-dsm-5-diagnosti... I want to highlight an important sentence: > To receive a diagnosis of depression, these symptoms must cause the individual clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning. The symptoms must also not be a result of substance abuse or another medical condition.

zepto 7y ago

The chemical imbalance theory is not supported by science, but is used by drug companies for marketing.

abstractbarista 7y ago

Are you sure? I thought the "chemical imbalance" story was made up by pharmaceutical companies to justify their new class of antidepressants. https://qz.com/1162154/30-years-after-prozac-arrived-we-still-buy-the-lie-that-chemical-imbalances-cause-depression/ https://qz.com/1162154/30-years-after-prozac-arrived-we-stil...

austincheney 7y ago
Yes, I am sure. Drugs are a medical treatment for depression but are not the only or generally preferred treatment.
- krilly 7y ago
  Have you ever tried to seek treatment for depression? I and others I know have found it incredibly hard to get any sort of treatment other than the SSRI at the top of their list.
kdmccormick 7y ago
I mean, if you think about what a brain is, you could consider basically any any mental disorder is just a "chemical imbalance". Saying that depression is one isn't false, but, to your point, I think pharmaceutical companies harp on this point in order to sell antidepressants. What GP gets right, though, is that depression != sadness. It is normal (and often healthy) to feel sadness after experiencing loss or other hardships. It is not healthy to feel hopeless and devoid of energy for months on end... that's what depression is.

curuinor 7y ago

If it is a chemical imbalance only, why are there large differences in rate in different time periods in the same culture, with suicide rates hand in hand (https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/9/e023144 https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/9/e023144)? Why does the depression rate go way up during recessions and other economic phenomena (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4741013/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4741013/)? What biological-chemical thing happens during an economic recession?

austincheney 7y ago
Financial distress is a key catalyst associated with suicidal ideations. That doesn’t mean financially distressed people are generally suicidal or even depressed. It does mean that stresses associated with finances are a frequently identified/measured trauma that can impact depressed persons who may not be clinically diagnosed as depressed. Depression is often undiagnosed and self-managed like many other mental health diseases.
- curuinor 7y ago
  So it's the trauma that does it? Where's the biochemical basis of trauma? I mean, when you get hit by a car and you get shock from blood loss, you die of shock from blood loss but you also die from the car. You could solve the problem with better EMT's and blood transfusions and stuff but you could also solve the problem by having better public transit and not having cars everywhere, you know?
  - austincheney 7y ago
    Wikipedia explains this better than I could: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_trauma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_trauma

starpilot 7y ago

The chemical imbalance theory is BS and dead https://qr.ae/T6UgWb https://qr.ae/T6UgWb. We don't understand depression fully, but more signs are pointing to low neurogenesis in the hippocampus. Chem imbalance may draw from medieval notions of imbalanced humors.

austincheney 7y ago
> Chem imbalance may draw from It draws from the preferred means of treatment for suicide survivors: controlled boredom under observation by mental health professionals in a hospital until emotional equilibrium is reestablished from the lack of external stimulus.