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Explanations of depression - Coggle Diagram
Explanations of depression
Biological (Oruc et. al)
Genetic
First degree relatives share 50% of their DNA which means depression could be transmitted from one generation to the next
In Oruc's study, 16 of the bipolar participants had a first degree relative with the disorder
Neurochemical
Depressed individuals have a low activity of serotonin and norepinephrine neurotransmitters
Oruc's study
Aim
To test whether there are polymorphisms (gene variation) in serotonin receptor 2c(5HTR2c) and serotonin transporter (SERT/5-HTT) which causes bipolar and related disorders
Sample
42 participants (25F and 17M, aged 31 - 70) diagnosed with bipolar disorder from 2 psychiatric hospitals in Croatia
40 participants from control group
Results
There were no significant differences between the 2 groups
Serotonin is sexually dimorphic and females have trends of polymorphism in the serotonin genes which explains increased risk of bipolar in females
Cognitive (Beck)
Beck explains depression due to incorrect information processing
The irrational thinking is called cognitive distortion
Negative events + schemas (knowledge/memory) = pessimistic thoughts about the future
Cognitive distortion is the automatic process which develops as a result of earlier life experiences through developing schemas
Cognitive triad
Negative thoughts about oneself - I am worthless
Negative thoughts about the world - Everyone hates me because I am worthless
Negative thoughts about the future - I will never be good at anything because everyone hates me
Learnt helplessness (Seligman et. al)
Learned helplessness is when depressed individuals go through a negative experience in which they feel they have a lack of control
They can't prevent suffereing
Stop resisting over time
Due to negative attributional style
Example - Seligman's study on dogs
They received electric shocks which prevented them from escaping (lack of control)
They couldn't prevent getting shocked (suffering), so they stopped trying
Even though they later had an opportunity to escape, due to past experiences, they did no try
Attributional style - the cognitive process of how people explain causes of events and behaviour
It is biased as it is based on life experiences
Negative event can be attributed by
Internal - It is all my fault
Stable - Things will stay bad forever
Global - More things will go wrong
Seligman's study
Aim
To investigate how well attributional style can predict depressive symptoms
Sample
39 patients with unipolar depression
12 had bipolar disorder
Control group of 10 participants
(Mix of genders with mean age of 36)
Procedure
All participants completed the BDI to assess severity of depression symptoms
They completed the Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ)
12 hypothetical good and bad situations
They had to rate the cause for the events on a 7-point scale for internality, stability and globality
Results
Bipolar and Unipolar patients had more pessimistic, negative attributional styles than the control group
The more the severe the score on the BDI, the worse the pessimism on the ASQ
Note - positive correlation between the BDI and ASQ does not indicate a causal relationship
Evaluation of ASQ
Standardised measure - high reliability
Quantitative data - numerical - objective - statistical analysis - high validity