Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

sciencebulletin.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 72 posts

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#51

Post by tdkl »

AimHere wrote: post #39
tdkl wrote: post #17

Or "depressed" children simply aren't smitten by simple artificial gifts.

So what makes non-depressed kids more smitten? What's interesting is that there is a differentiation between the two, not which is the 'right' way to behave. You can throw your own emotional spin on this phenomenon if you like, but the scientist's job was to investigate whether there is a phenomenon of this sort, and they did just that.

> So what makes non-depressed kids more smitten?

That they're receptive to BS tests and more easily manipulated ?

> What's interesting is that there is a differentiation between the two, not which is the 'right' way to behave.

Interesting ? Of course there's a differentiation between the two, human brains don't operate the same.

But my point was with the common popular notion of claiming someone as depressed as something being notoriously bad with them and "not normal". What if the 'depressive realism' (as mentioned in this thread) is actually a feature that humans should develop to more rationally meet their choices in life? Now that's a question I find more interesting.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#52

Post by Nekorosu »

gomijacogeo wrote: post #14

“If they’re persistently sad, irritable or less motivated, those are markers that may indicate depression, even in kids as young as 3 or 4, and we would recommend that parents get them evaluated.” Speaking from personal experience, if a 3 or 4 year old is displaying symptoms of depression, there's shit happening at home and the parents are neck-deep in denial about their role and pigs will fly before they get help fo…

There is also genetic factor. Infant depression can happen in a perfectly fine family. Of course if parents don't know how to deal with this problem it will get worse. Education helps.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#53

Post by Nekorosu »

gomijacogeo wrote: post #14

“If they’re persistently sad, irritable or less motivated, those are markers that may indicate depression, even in kids as young as 3 or 4, and we would recommend that parents get them evaluated.” Speaking from personal experience, if a 3 or 4 year old is displaying symptoms of depression, there's shit happening at home and the parents are neck-deep in denial about their role and pigs will fly before they get help fo…

Nevermind you have elaborated your point in the new comments.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#54

Post by GavinMcG »

fgm842 wrote: post #18
meteoricrise wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so in your claimed expert opinion, depressed kids are depressed because of the parents actions; and their parents won't ever give a shit. But so what? Why write that? The folks doing this research know more than you do about the causes of their depression; and they know more than you do about the difficulties in addressing any causes. But unlike you, instead of implying that they're foolish for trying to make the…

I don't he or she meant it that way, the OP said "from personal experience". Your response was uncalled for...

I disagree. You and I know that personal experience isn't good to generalize from. But in my personal experience, the vast majority of the time that people use the phrase, they do so to communicate that they know things to be a certain way, at least strongly enough to base other conclusions on.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#55

Post by laumars »

dkersten wrote: post #49
jetpks wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Speaking from personal experience, if a 3 or 4 year old is displaying symptoms of depression, there's shit happening at home and the parents are neck-deep in denial about their role and pigs will fly before they get help for their kid. Depression definitely can be caused by abuse. In fact if you're being abused you are probably also depressed. Depression and other mental illnesses are also often caused by things th…

I didn't read GP as necessarily being about abuse, but even stuff like the parents arguing in front of the child.

I didn't read GPs post that way either, however I still agree with jetpks' point regarding depression. Mental illness is a medical condition so cannot be dismissed as a parenting problem. While some instances of depression will be symptoms of a child's home life, others will be medical.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#56

Post by douche »

cairo_x wrote: post #13

I can attest to this. Grew up with Bipolar II, and Christmas was always the worst due to the dissonance of the joy around you and your own bad feelings. Birthdays were worse, because then you couldn't escape the attention. I specifically requested to stop having birthday parties -rather to just have a small family dinner. I think my parents were just baffled, thought I was moody/cynical. I really wish I was diagnosed…

My birthday is always the worst day of the year. Of course, it's also in the depths of March, when it's freezing cold, icy, and dark. But it's also a silly custom that everyone else gets much too excited about, and so the disconnect between their expectations of my emotions and my lack of emotion about it is somewhat painful.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#57

Post by kbart »

a_bonobo wrote: post #40
meriobrudar wrote: post #27

Wait, so they had kids choose a door and there was a 50% chance they get a point or lose a point? And that's what constitutes scientific research these days? Did they even account for the kids figuring out that whether they win or lose is completely random and there's no skill or pattern involved? You know, like "what's even the point of trying if it's all random anyway"? Maybe that's why some kids weren't thrilled t…

>Although still analogous to “gambling” tasks used with older samples, the modified version uses varying level of prizes (e.g., poor prize = a single yellow pencil; a great prize = a doll o r nerf toys) instead of the typical monetary incentives. That is, young children do not have a c lear conception of money and its relative quantities; however, at very young ages, children r eactive positively to prizes and gifts.…

"The experimenter explained that the box of to ys the children could pick from depended on the total number points they earned by guessing doors with either green vs red arrows behind them."

Sounds the same to me as what OP suggested. Even as a child (as early as I remember) I hated praise and rewards when I didn't feel I had deserved it by my own efforts. Guessing random events is not among things I consider conscious effort. Furthermore, children background could have impact too: the one from poorer family would be happier to receive a small gift versus the one from rich family that already has a room full of all the toys he could want.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#58

Post by erelde »

laumars wrote: post #55
dkersten wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't read GP as necessarily being about abuse, but even stuff like the parents arguing in front of the child.

I didn't read GPs post that way either, however I still agree with jetpks' point regarding depression. Mental illness is a medical condition so cannot be dismissed as a parenting problem. While some instances of depression will be symptoms of a child's home life, others will be medical.

I don't understand how the parenting problem being the root cause of the mental illness dismisses the mental illness.

Imagine if the child is sick (eg in pneumonia) it wouldn't dismiss the illness if I explained how the child got sick because their parents left them outside freezing.

It's not dismissing, it's analyzing the root cause, to try and help the child. If something causes illness (mental and/or physical), we should take care of both the illness and the cause.

In the case of depression, finding a true unique cause is still open for debate/research, but it shoudn't prevent us from helping someone who's depressed.

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#59

Post by harpiaharpyja »

laumars wrote: post #55
dkersten wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't read GP as necessarily being about abuse, but even stuff like the parents arguing in front of the child.

I didn't read GPs post that way either, however I still agree with jetpks' point regarding depression. Mental illness is a medical condition so cannot be dismissed as a parenting problem. While some instances of depression will be symptoms of a child's home life, others will be medical.

Sorry if I'm reading into this too much but are you implying that medical conditions cannot have environmental causes?

Re: Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

#60

Post by harpiaharpyja »

fgm842 wrote: post #25
gomijacogeo wrote: post #14

“If they’re persistently sad, irritable or less motivated, those are markers that may indicate depression, even in kids as young as 3 or 4, and we would recommend that parents get them evaluated.” Speaking from personal experience, if a 3 or 4 year old is displaying symptoms of depression, there's shit happening at home and the parents are neck-deep in denial about their role and pigs will fly before they get help fo…

Depression is caused by more than just external events. Yes, based on personal experience, but there are more factors to be considered and fixing one issue may not solve the problem. "Rather, depression has many possible causes, including faulty mood regulation by the brain, genetic vulnerability, stressful life events, medications, and medical problems."[0]( https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/what-causes-d…

In my experience there is significant coupling between external events and one's ability/willingness to maintain physiological health.
Post reply on HN