Depression is a very common mood disturbance. It can vary from almost universal "blue" moods to a serious, chronic, and incapacitating disorder. Because at least some of the characteristics of deep depression occur occasionally in most people, it is possible to study depression in a general population. In any population, there seems to be a more or less continuous distribution of people along a dimension running from depression to elation.

Severe depression is characterized by depressed mood, loss of interest in others and normally desirable things (such as food), feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, and worhtlessness, and slowed down thought and motor activity. Many of these symptoms appear in mild forms in the general population. It is reasonable to expect that mildly depressed people will show some of the same bases or causes of their symptoms as severely depressed people.

There are a number of theories of depression, and several biological theories of this disorder will be discussed in class and in your text.

Among these are several theories that depression is based in part on abnormalities in the functioning of neurotransmitter pathways in the brain for norepinephrine and serotonin. These two neurotransmitters are often found to be at lower levels in people who are depressed, and many drug therapies for depression are designed to increase levels of these neurotransmitters in the nervous system. If you consider the diagram to the left, you can see that these neurotransmitter pathways are widely dispersed in the brain, but that both of them play a role in the areas of the brain responsible for emotion regulation and the sensation of pleasure--the so-called "reward centers" of the brain. If depression is caused by disruptions of these neurotransmitter systems, perhaps it is no surprise that depressed people take little pleasure in life.

Another theory of depression is a bit more experiential. That is, it has been proposed that people feel depressed because bad things happen to them. Clearly, some people get depressed in the face of success and others remain nondepressed even after a series of adverse events. Nonetheless, it seems reasonable to think that negative experiences would contribute to the causation of depression. In this investigation, we will test the hypothesis that people who are more depressed have had relatively more adverse experiences in the recent past.

A major purpose of this investigation is to illustrate some of the difficulties that arise in the scientific study of psychopathology. As you will see, it can be very difficult to make definitive measurements that will clearly support a particular hypothesis--in this case, that adverse life events can stimulate a bout of depression. Hopefully, you will appreciate the difficulty of the research while at the same time realize that progress can be made.

The first problem we face is this: how do we measure depression? A basic issue that arises is the matter of "subjective" versus "objective" measurement. In the case of a "mood" disorder, one might be inclined to subjective measurement, and indeed, much of the diagnosis of depression is based on what people say about how they feel. More objective measurement might include observation of people (their facial expressions, behaviors such as crying or curling into a ball, their overall levels of activity), or having them report on their own activities (how many hours they sleep each night, for example). In this study we will use a totally subjective measure--the subject's rating of his or her own mood.

Remember that we are dealing here with the range of depression and elation seen in the general population, and not with people actually diagnosed as depressed. In the case of diagnosis, interview and observation by an experienced clinician is involved, sometimes along with administration of a question inventory. We will use only self-ratings of mood and will collect two such ratings: one for the subject's momentary mood (how depressed he or she feels right now), and the other for how depressed he or she has felt in general over the past year.

The second problem is this: how do we develop a measure of the incidence of negative and positive events in the recent life of each subject? We will use as our measure here the subject's recall of negative and positive events over the past year. There are many problems and alternative interpretations of the results of this procedure (can you think of some?). We will discuss them in class after you have served as a subject in this study.

First, print out the data sheet you will find linked at the bottom of this page. Then, move on to the study.

Note that your responses to this study are completely anonymous; your name should not appear on any of the materials you choose to submit. If you feel uncomfortable at any time during this study, feel free not to participate. The pooled results will be used to stimulate class discussion

When you have your data sheet (don't put your name on it!) and are ready to continue, read on.

Your Mood Now and Over the Year:

First, fill out the two rating scales below and enter your self-ratings in the appropriate place on your data sheet. Then continue on to the recall task.

Rate what you judge to be your mood right now. Write the number that reflects the answer you think best represents your current mood in the appropriate place on your data sheet.

Using the same scale, rate what you judge to have been your mood on average over the past twelve months. Write the number that reflects the answer you think best represents your average mood over the year in the appropriate place on your data sheet.

Recall of Negative and Positive Events:

For this measure, you will need the assistance of a friend or teammate who will time two separate two-minute intervals for you. No one but you will see what you write down.

You will go through two recall tasks, in order, one after the other. Get a pen or pencil and a blank sheet of paper and sit at a table. When you are comfortable, ask a friend to say "Go" when he or she is ready to time you, and starts his/her timing of two minutes. When your friend says "Go," list all of the negative things that have happened to you in the last twelve months on the sheet of paper.

Your friend should say "Stop" at the end of two minutes, and you should put down your pen or pencil at that time.

Now, pick it up again and ask your friend to time you once more. This time, when he or she says "Go," write down all of the positive things that have happened to you in the past twelve months. Stop when your friend says the two minutes are up.

Count up the number of negative and the number of positive events that you remembered. Put these numbers in the appropriate place on your data sheet. Also, enter the difference betwen the number of negative events and the number of positive events (the number of negative events minus the number of positive events). Put this number in the appropriate place on your data sheet.

Dispose of the sheets of paper on which you have recalled your events as you see fit. Only the data sheet will be turned in to your instructor. Again, if you are uncomfortable at any time with this study, you are free not to complete it. Your name should not appear on any of the materials you submit.

We'll discuss the results in class.

Depression and Life Events Data Sheet

(You'll need a computer that can open an MS Word document to download and print this data sheet.)

References:

Jonides, J. & Rozin, P. (1983). Study Guide for Gleitman's Basic Psychology. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company