Depressed children respond differently to rewards than other kids

Post by herbst » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 2:22 PM UTC

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…

Post by laumars » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 2:43 PM UTC

erelde wrote: post #58

laumars wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 3:08 PM UTC

erelde wrote: post #65

laumars wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depression is a vague overly-general term so it differs from person to person. There isn't going to be a "true unique cause". In some instances it's just a result of chemical imbalances rather than emotional conditioning from the parents. Thus you cannot brush depression of as being environmental.

A cause isn't necessarily environmental, it can be, and even if it is "a result of chemical imbalances", there's still a cause, and if we could find the causes for the multiple forms of mental illnesses wouldn't that be good?

Post by Gravityloss » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 3:14 PM UTC

douche wrote: post #4

wapz wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a better take away is the reverse. If you are rewarding children in your class (or your kids) and one is not enthusiastic then you should take note there might be a problem (essentially the first sentence of the article).

I'd be very careful here. Perhaps the particular reward is not perceived by the child as a reward? I can think of any number of things that one party might perceive as a reward that would be, to me, uncomfortable or meh.

Post by jayajay » Wed, Dec 21, 2016, 1:59 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #19

jayajay wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. Instead, kid enters the room, you tell them that they will be sitting there anywhere from 5 minutes to 3 hours, depending on how long the experiment should be. They get to choose a sequence of doors. At each step, the door can either contain +10 minutes or -10 minutes, representing the number of minutes which will be either added to or subtracted from their experiment duration, respectively. My guess is…

Depression has little to do with boredom. I think a depressed person would be more likely to ignore all your doors, or open a few without caring one way or the other. But I'm not a psychiatrist.