Biological Interventions & Therapies of Depression (AQA GCSE Psychology)

The use of antidepressant medications to treat depression

• Biological treatments are commonly used to treat disorders such as depression using drug therapy

• The use of drug therapy is in line with the biomedical approach to treating disorders

• The depressed patient is prescribed a drug (an antidepressant) that will work on the physical cause of the disorder e.g. dysfunctional brain chemistry

• Antidepressants are widely used as a way of re-balancing neurochemicals which (in theory) should restore the patient’s balanced mood

• The most widely prescribed form of antidepressant is the Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor (SSRI):

  • Reuptake occurs when molecules of serotonin do not cross the synaptic cleft i.e. they have not been transmitted to the postsynaptic neuron

  • The ‘spare’ molecules of serotonin are then taken back up into the presynaptic neuron

  • SSRIs work by preventing the reuptake of serotonin in the synaptic cleft back into the presynaptic neuron

  • Prevention of reuptake makes serotonin more accessible in the brain

  • More serotonin is then available to improve the transmission of messages between neurons

  • SSRIs are called selective because they mainly affect serotonin, not other neurotransmitters such as dopamine

  • SSRIs may also be used to treat conditions other than depression, such as anxiety disorders

• Low serotonin levels have been linked to depressive symptoms - this is known as the serotonin hypothesis (see the previous revision note) so ensuring that all available serotonin crosses the synaptic cleft should result in reduced depression

SSRIs work by preventing serotonin molecules from being re-absorbed back into the presynaptic neuron

Evaluation of  biological interventions & therapies

Strengths

• Drug therapy is cost-effective which means that it has less negative implications for the economy than expensive therapies such as CBT

• Drug medication means that the patient is to some extent in charge of their recovery; they do not have to be hospitalised or undergo intensive psychiatric scrutiny

Weaknesses

• Drug therapy is a reductionist approach to treating depression as it over-simplifies the mechanisms of depression, highlighting one neurochemical explanation instead of considering a range of possible contributory factors

• Drugs tend to bring with them side effects which may, in some cases, make the depression even worse, for example:

  • nausea

  • dizziness

  • anxiety

  • suicidal ideation