What I want to tell you is that the etiology and pathogenesis of depression have not yet been fully elucidated. The human brain and nervous system and psychological phenomena are too complicated. At present, people's research on depression is still in the exploratory stage, and they are all exploring from different angles. It does not yet have a well-formed explanation.
At present, scientific research has found some factors closely related to depression. The first is genetic factors. The first-degree relatives of depression patients, that is, parents, siblings, or children, are about 2-4 times more likely to suffer from depression than the general population. We often encounter depression in many people in a family. In the community of the Institute of Depression, there is a pair of father and daughter. His father is bipolar disorder and often has depressive episodes. The daughter suffers from depression.
The tennis player Cliff Ritchie, who once ranked No. 1 in the United States, suffered from depression. Both his father and grandfather had suffered from depression. But the basis for this conclusion is only the phenomenon of illness. Researchers use twin research, foster child research and other methods. It was found that relatives of depression patients also had a higher proportion of depression.
As for why this phenomenon occurs, is it caused by genetic inheritance? If so, which gene locus or basis set is this inheritance located. The answers to these questions are still unclear. According to a paper published in the American Journal of Psychiatry in 2019. The researchers found that the depression gene slc6a4 has nothing to do with depression. I believe that many netizens have seen this Weibo hot search when they are scanning the Weibo . What needs to be understood correctly for this message is. This set of genes has nothing to do with depression and overturns the hypothesis 20 years ago.
However, whether there are other genes related to depression is still uncertain. Now we are just based on the fact that many relatives of depression patients also suffer from depression, and the proportion is significantly higher than that of ordinary families. This phenomenon exists. Someone will ask questions. Many people do not have depression in the family,But he got it, how to explain it.
There are two speculations on this issue. It is that the depression gene may have a performance problem. Carrying genes does not necessarily show depression. But after genetic recombination, the next generation may show depression. In addition to genetic inheritance, there are external environmental factors. It is necessary to know that the human brain is plastic. External environmental stimuli can change the human neurotransmitter level, the number of neurons, and the synaptic connections and conduction pathways, so external Environmental stimuli may also cause depression.
The second is biochemical factors. The biochemical factors include two. One is physical disease. The other is above the neurotransmitter level.
Somatic lesions means that some people who have a brain tumor may have symptoms of depression. Because those that the tumor may touch are associated with depressive symptoms. For example, brain regions like limbic system or diabetes patients are prone to depression.
Due to dietary restrictions, concerns about diseases, and changes in certain books. Such as blood sugar disorders and neuroendocrine abnormalities, these all increase the possibility of depression. However, in the sense that the level of neurotransmitter is compared to the baseline level, it is generally considered to be the main cause of depression.
In the middle of the 20th century, some researchers studied the brains of some suicides with depression. Through the microscope, the concentration of the three neurotransmitters in the brain is different from that of ordinary people. These three neurotechnologies are: serotonin-based serotonin, adrenaline and dopamine . The antidepressants currently on the market are based on how to mediate the levels of these three neurotransmitters.
Serotonin is involved in the regulation of physiological functions such as pain, sleep and body temperature.It mainly affects the level of human pleasure. The serotonin of depression patients is usually lower than that of ordinary people, so they will have sleep disturbances, especially insomnia, and the experience of pleasure is reduced, and they feel unhappy. Many people with depression engage in self-harm and say that they do not feel pain. It may also be caused by low serotonin levels.
Dopamine controls people's thinking and whether they are active. The dopamine level of depression patients is usually lower than that of ordinary people. Therefore, patients with depression usually experience psychomotor agitation and feel irritable.
On the one hand, adrenaline mainly affects the appetite and libido of patients with depression. The adrenaline of depression patients is higher or lower than that of adults, so depression patients may have eating disorders. Some overeating. Some have a loss of appetite.
The third related factor of depression is psychological factors, that is, individual temperament and personality factors. Generally speaking, people with low self-esteem and people with pessimistic thinking are more prone to depression. There is a story that reflects the difference between optimistic thinking and pessimistic thinking. I believe everyone has heard it.
is also walking in the desert. An optimistic person sees half a bottle of water in the bottle and says happily: It's great, there is half a bottle of water left. The pessimistic person will say: Oops, only half a bottle of water is left. Cognition affects emotions, and pessimistic cognition will bring down emotions. People with low self-esteem and pessimism are easy to think of the negative side of things and tend to feel inferior and blame themselves. Over a long period of time, accumulation of less and more can lead to depression.
Depression is mainly caused by genetic and biochemical reasons. We call it endogenous depression . Depression caused by the external environment is called exogenous depression, also called psychogenic depression . It is called depressive neurosis caused by psychological factors, and it usually manifests as dysthymia. Caused by environmental stress factors is called reactive depression.
At this point, we have introduced three possible causes of depression: genetic factors, biochemical factors, and psychological factors. Next we talk about another factor,That is the external social environmental factors.
In the long term, this kind of environmental factor includes stress accumulation and weak social support system. From a short-term perspective, it mainly includes traumatic events, such as violence, abuse, and broken relationships, as well as stressful events. Such as the sudden death of a loved one, natural disasters. Long-term pressure accumulation, such as the growth and education environment, the neglected life in the medium and long term, the lack of care, or the stressful event of a period of time such as going to school or promotion.
I once met a patient with depression. She has been bullied and isolated on campus for a long time. In school, she has few friends. Eating leftovers, being ridiculed, and being beaten are common occurrences. When she tried to ask her classmates for help, no one responded. When she asked the teacher for help, the teacher put on a posture of disbelief. She wanted to ask her family for help, but her family patriarchal, never really cared about her. Long-term lack of care, coupled with academic pressure. Two years later, I got depression and dropped out of school. With depression, she began to doubt herself and felt that no one liked him, it was all her fault. However, all day long and depressed, I don't want to talk or do things. I don't feel any nostalgia for this world. Finally wanted to commit suicide to seek relief.
Why does a long-term stressful environment make people depressed? Endocrinologist and biochemist Sayli divided the process of adapting to stress into three stages.
One is the alert stage. At this stage, the incident was discovered and alert, while preparing for battle.
The second is the fighting phase, in which all efforts are made to respond to the incident and eliminate pressure or adapt to pressure, or retreat.
The third is the exhaustion stage, this stage consumes a lot of physical and psychological resources. Finally exhausted.
When a person faces pressure for a long time. After the intensity of this pressure is often beyond the self-bearable range, various problems will arise in the body and mind. Depression may follow. Just like the girl in the story. She has struggled, worked hard, and asked for help. But in the end it was crushed.
There is actually another reason for depression. That is the long-term weak social support system.
refers to the social support system. The material and spiritual help and support that a person can get from others in his social network. The social support system can be said to be the most important factor among environmental factors. But this factor has been seriously ignored. When you are in trouble, if someone can give you a hand, you won’t be depressed. In the example we just talked about, it is obvious that the protagonist did not have a social support system at the time. So she couldn't hold it in the end and became depressed.
Regarding the cause of depression, there is another saying that depression is caused by a combination of internal and external environmental factors. Internal causes refer to the genetic, biochemical factors and psychological characteristics of individuals. This also affects the individual's depression value and determines the individual's susceptibility to depression, that is, how likely it is to suffer from depression. The external environmental factors determine whether this possibility will happen in the end.
This process can be compared to the process of pulling the trigger. Internal reasons represent whether there are bullets in the gun and how many. The external environmental reasons symbolize the pressure exerted by pulling the trigger. If there is no bullet in the magazine, the individual does not have the depressive factor at the moment. Even if the trigger is pulled, the shooting will not occur. If there is a bullet in the gun and there is no depressive stress environment, the individual will not get depression. Only when the individual has depressive traits and external factors put pressure on the individual, the bullet will finally be shot.
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