depression's evolutionary roots

[fizzgig]

Depression seems to pose an evolutionary paradox. Research in the US and other countries estimates that between 30 to 50 percent of people have met current psychiatric diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder sometime in their lives. But the brain plays crucial roles in promoting survival and reproduction, so the pressures of evolution should have left our brains resistant to such high rates of malfunction. Mental disorders should generally be rare — why isn’t depression?

This paradox could be resolved if depression were a problem of growing old. The functioning of all body systems and organs, including the brain, tends to deteriorate with age. This is not a satisfactory explanation for depression, however, as people are most likely to experience their first bout in adolescence and young adulthood.

Or, perhaps, depression might be like obesity — a problem that arises because modern conditions are so different from those in which we evolved. Homo sapiens did not evolve with cookies and soda at the fingertips. Yet this is not a satisfactory explanation either. The symptoms of depression have been found in every culture which has been carefully examined, including small-scale societies, such as the Ache of Paraguay and the !Kung of southern Africa — societies where people are thought to live in environments similar to those that prevailed in our evolutionary past.

There is another possibility: that, in most instances, depression should not be thought of as a disorder at all. In an article recently published in Psychological Review, we argue that depression is in fact an adaptation, a state of mind which brings real costs, but also brings real benefits.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=depressions-evolutionary

i'm still digesting this, but i thought it was an interesting read and wanted to pass it along to you guys.

i hope everyone is doing well :hi:

[david13]

1. I don't know about the evolutionary root of it, but I do understand

the hereditary or genetic nature of it, and the imitative or contagious nature of it.
But I don't purport to understand anybody, other than myself, and then not all the time, perhaps not accurately, not in all situations, not to a full extent?
dc

[elleng]

2. I agree it is interesting,

and hope I can get around my present mood to think about 'real costs, but also brings real benefits.'

[mopinko]

3. i think this is really interesting

evolutionary psychology is going to give us a whole new way to look at a lot of things, if we can ever get it past the people who are offended at their own primate-ness.