PATH 06 - Depression characteristics and explanations 1 Flashcards
(19 cards)
What is depression?
A mental disorder characterised by low mood and low energy levels
What is behavioural?
Ways in which people act and can be observed
What is emotional?
Related to a person’s feelings or mood
What is cognitive?
Refers to the process of ‘knowing’, including thinking, reasoning, remembering, believing
What are some key facts about depression?
- The lifetime risk of depression is 15%
- Median age of onset (diagnosis) is 31 (but most people experience symptoms for up to five years before diagnosis)
- The risk for females (20%) is twice as high as for males (10%)
What are the categories of depression and depressive disorders?
- Major depressive disorder => severe but often short-term depression
- Persistent depressive disorder => long-term or recurring depression, including sustained major depression and what used to be called dysthymia
- Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder => childhood temper tantrums
- Premenstrual dysphoric disorder => disruption to mood prior to and/or during menstruation
What are the behavioural characteristics of depression?
- Activity levels
- Disruption to sleep and eating behaviour
- Aggression and self-harm
Explain the behavioural characteristic of depression: activity levels.
- People with depression have reduced levels of energy, making them lethargic
- This has a knock-on effect with people tending to withdraw from work, education and social life
- In extreme cases this can be so severe that the person cannot get out of bed
- In some cases, depression can lead to the opposite effect, known as psychomotor agitation
- Agitated individuals struggle to relax and may end up pacing up and down a room
Explain the behavioural characteristic of depression: disruption to sleep and eating behaviour.
- Depression is associated with changes to sleeping behaviour
- A person may experience reduced sleep (insomnia) particularly premature waking, or an increased need for sleep (hypersomnia)
- Appetite and eating may increase or decrease, leading to weight gain or loss
- The key point is that such behaviours are disrupted by depression
Explain the behavioural characteristic of depression: aggression and self-harm.
- People with depression are often irritable, and in some cases, they can become verbally or physically aggressive
- This can have serious knock-on effects on a number of aspects of their life
- For example, someone experiencing depression might display verbal aggression by ending a relationship or quitting a job
- Depression can also lead to physical aggression directed against the self
- This includes self-harm, often in the form of cutting, or suicide attempts
What are the emotional characteristics of depression?
- Lowered mood
- Anger
- Lowered self-esteem
Explain the emotional characteristic of depression: lowered mood.
- Lowered mood is still a defining emotional element of depression, but it is more pronounced than in the daily kind of experience of feeling lethargic and sad
- People with depression often describe themselves as ‘worthless’ and ‘empty’
Explain the emotional characteristic of depression: anger.
- Although people with depression tend to experience more negative emotions and fewer positive ones during episodes of depression, this experience of negative emotion is not limited to sadness
- People with depression also frequently experience anger, sometimes extreme anger
- This can be directed at the self or others
- On occasion such emotions lead to aggressive or self-harming behaviour which is why this characteristic appears under behavioural characteristics as well
Explain the emotional characteristic of depression: anger.
- Although people with depression tend to experience more negative emotions and fewer positive ones during episodes of depression, this experience of negative emotion is not limited to sadness
- People with depression also frequently experience anger, sometimes extreme anger
- This can be directed at the self or others
- On occasion such emotions lead to aggressive or self-harming behaviour which is why this characteristic appears under behavioural characteristics as well
Explain the emotional characteristic of depression: lowered self-esteem.
- Self-esteem is the emotional experience of how much we like ourselves
- People with depression tend to report reduced self-esteem (they like themselves less than usual)
- This can be quite extreme, with some people with depression describing a sense of self-loathing i.e. hating themselves
What are the cognitive characterisitcs of depression?
- Poor concentration
- Attending to and dwelling on the negative
- Absolutist thinking
Explain the cognitive characteristic of depression: poor concentration.
- Depression is associated with poor levels of concentration
- The person may find themselves unable to stick with a task as they usually would, or they might find it hard to make decisions that they would normally find straightforward
- Poor concentration and poor decision-making are likely to interfere with the individual’s work
Explain the cognitive characteristic of depression: absolutist thinking.
- Most situations are not all-good or all-bad, when a person is depressed, they tend to think in these terms
- This is sometimes called ‘black-and-white thinking’
- This means that when a situation is unfortunate, they tend to see it as an absolute disaster
Explain the cognitive characteristic of depression: attending to and dwelling on the negative.
- When experiencing a depressive episode people are inclined to pay more attention to negative aspects of a situation and ignore the positives
- In other words, they tend to see a glass as half-empty rather than half-full
- People with depression also have a bias towards recalling unhappy events rather than happy ones (the opposite bias that people have when not depressed)
