Question

Describe two ways in which psychological factors can contribute to depression.

Answer 1

Psychological causal factors in depression:

1. Stressful life events: Psychological stressors are known to be involved in the onset of a variety of disorders, ranging from some of the anxiety disorders to schizophrenia, but nowhere has their role been more carefully studied than in the case of unipolar major depression. Many studies have shown that severely stressful life events often serve as precipitating factors for depression. Most of the episodic stressful life events involved in precipitating depression involve loss of a loved one, serious threats to important close relationships or to one’s occupation, or severe economic or serious health problems. For example, separations through death or divorce are strongly associated with depression, although such losses also tend to precede other disorders such as panic disorder and generalized anxiety. Losses that involve an element of humiliation can be especially potent. The stress of being the caregiver to a spouse with a debilitating disease such as Alzheimer’s is also known to be associated with the onset of both major depression and generalized anxiety disorder in the caregiver. An important distinction has been made between stressful life events that are independent of the person’s behavior and personality (independent life events, such as losing a job because one’s company is shutting down or having one’s house hit by a hurricane) and events that may have been at least partly generated by the depressed person’s behavior or personality (dependent life events). For example, people with depression sometimes generate stressful life events through their poor interpersonal problem solving (such as being unable to resolve conflicts with a spouse), which is often associated with depression. The poor problem solving in turn leads to higher levels of interpersonal stress, which in turn leads to further symptoms of depression.

2. Behavioral theories:  In the 1970s and 1980s, several theorists in the behavioral tradition developed behavioral theories of depression, proposing that people become depressed either when their responses no longer produce positive reinforcement or when their rate of negative reinforcements increases. Such theories are consistent with research showing that people with depression do indeed receive fewer positive verbal and social reinforcements from their families and friends than do people who are not depressed and also experience more negative events. Moreover, they have lower activity levels, and their moods seem to vary with both their positive and their negative reinforcement rates. Nevertheless, although such findings are consistent with behavioral theories, they do not show that depression is caused by these factors. Instead, it may be that some of the primary symptoms of depression, such as pessimism and low levels of energy, cause the person with depression to experience these lower rates of reinforcement, which in turn may help maintain the depression. For this and other reasons, behavioral theories of the causes of depression are no longer very influential.