Psych-Mat

What causes depression?

Why it is important to understand the causes of clinical depression?

Probably the most important reason for having an understanding of what causes depression is that it enables one to design the optimal treatment plan. For example, if you moved from the tropics to Canada and did not see the sun for days at a time then, your psychotherapist might point out that there is scientific evidence that lack of sunlight is correlated with depression and suggest that light therapy might be the treatment of choice.  Another reason for knowing the cause of our depression is that many of us are curious to know what happened to us.  Furthermore if we don’t know why we are depressed, our depression can talk us into believing that we brought it upon ourselves because we are bad or stupid people or that we should feel guilty even for being depressed. Understanding the cause of depression can stop us from this kind of self blaming.

The causes of clinical depression are usually extremely complex.  Recent research has shown that the cause of clinical depression can be surprisingly complex:

What you should know about depression and how to manage it

How does clinical depression differ from normal sadness?

There are three important questions about depression which I often get asked in my clinical practice:

• How does clinical depression differ from normal sadness?
• What causes depression?
• What cures depression?

 
In today’s post I will answer the first question concerning how depression is defined. In following posts I will answer the other two.

We all experience te occasional few hours or even a few days in which we feel sad, or have the “blues”.  But how is this different from what a mental health professional would diagnose as clinical depression?   The answer is not simple; clinical experience suggests that three factors must be considered: the severity, duration, and context of the mood of sadness.