Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions

Hard went at depression in a bold way and directly attacked the way our professionals treat it. While his section on psychotherapy was weak the total book was really great! He addressed the issues of depression and meaning in life in a way that few people do in our culture.

Simply EXCELLENT. Very well written. I wish I had purchased the audible as well (not sure if they had that version). The writing is well crafted and the information is a must read for anyone especially mental health/substance abuse professionals. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. totally DIFFERENT, LOGICAL, TAKE ON THE OPIOD CRISIS. I can't stop telling my colleagues about this book.

If you have dealt or deal with anxiety and depression this is a very uniquely helpful and educational book. Excellent studies and interviews into the lives of people who have dealt with their depression and anxiety in ways different than the anti depressants that has been ingrained into our culture.

I suffer from depression (on the upswing partly due to this book) and found this book to be helpful and hopeful. It gives you a way to reframe what you are experiencing and a possible way out. I love it and recommend it.

Should be mandatory reading (listening). What an incredible job Hari has done. I have struggled with anxiety my whole life and have come to many of these conclusions without the back up of the various in depth studies he has provided. I found his work affirming, illuminating and necessary. I wish everyone I knew read this so we could begin an advanced conversation on what to do next.

I heard about this book from Tucker Carlson on FOX News.

As a Licensed Professional Counselor, I was eager to read the details of this well researched book. I don't know who the author is but I think he's someone kind of famous for writing prior books. I'm not into pop culture so I'm unsure.

He is British. He struggled with severe depression and anxiety. He spent many years taking medications and he suffered from the side effects such as weight gain.

Eventually he traveled far and wide to understand what really helps people who suffer from depression. He read the research and visited with top scholars. What he found shocked him. In particular was the research on SSRI's that shows a slight improvement for people, but most of that occurs from the placebo effect, which is a real effect that body has when it is given hope.

All of this I knew already, but it was fun to see how passionate he was about the topic. It was helpful to hear the actual statistics again. The anecdotes were unique and fresh.

After obliterating the remedies most specialists resort to, he then discusses what really helps people. Things like connection, sense of purpose, meaningful work, etc.

So yes, this a book I highly recommend and already have.

But there is one strange thing the author did that drove me crazy. Every so often he would take bashes at anything or anyone who is politically conservative. For instance he makes comments like this: "People vote for Trump because they think it will give them more freedom, when in fact it's the opposite."

Says who? Hari? It's in these moment he offers no argument and no real evidence.

This is the reason I give the book four stars.

It is a worthwhile read for a person suffering from depression or anxiety. However, one criticism is the blatant liberal slant. The author reaches the unfounded conclusion that income inequality causes depression, based on questionable research. I have never heard anyone actually indicate that they were unhappy with their job because executives make too much money. People are aware that many executives are overpaid relative to historic standards, and they are angry about it, but it doesn't particularly cause workplace depression. She did not consider the possibility that people suffer workplace depression due to job insecurity, which was not as common in previous generations. My parents and others from previous generations usually had good job security with expectation of lifetime employment if desired (provided performance was satisfactory). Working at a bank, insurance & other companies generally provided decent job security until the era of mergers, acquisitions and offshore transfer of jobs (which did not commonly occur in previous generations). These factors have significantly contributed to job insecurity and probably to depression / anxiety.

This book is like talking with the most personable individual you ever met. It is so valuable to me, and when I finish I am going to read it again and write notes in it. The information is so helpful to me.

“You aren’t a machine with broken parts. You are an animal whose needs are not being met. You need to have a community. You need to have meaningful values, not the junk values you’ve been pumped full of all your life, telling you happiness comes through money and buying objects. You need to have meaningful work. You need the natural world. You need to feel you are respected. You need a secure future. You need connections to all these things. You need to release any shame you might feel for having been mistreated.”

Coming from a collectivist society, most of what has been captured in this book rings true and solid. I like that the author invites one to imagine and re-examine personal beliefs about a topic that visits us at some point. Either through a personal encounter or through someone known to us. Here is a perspective that is revolutionary in the sense it is teaching us to look at what is broken in our society, not just ourselves. Grateful for it

From the beginning it is a page turner. He describes the "placebo effect" of antidepressants by citing a 1799 experiment with a metal rod

it was a real page tuner. it makes so much sense that I cannot begin to explain it all. Basically, antidepressants are placebos. If you lose a loved one and go to the doctor, they give you an antidepressant without acknowledging that the loss and grieving are normal. Your brain isnt sick and you don't need serotonin. You need love and community and satisfying work and a time to mourn. Chronically depressed people need to look at their lives. We are not living with strong connections or a tribal mentality. He cites studies and examples that are relevant and related in the form of various stories. You will find yourself nodding and saying "wow". Buy this book...then reach out to someone after you read it and give them the book and a hug and a purpose.

Even if you have never taken a drug for depression, even if you
take the pills and believe in them, but especially if you know from experience that the medications only dragged you into years of apathy, READ THIS BOOK!!! For those who resist the science of the first section, I recommend reading the 3 main sections in reverse . Start with the last, then go to the second section, then the first.

Fantastically insightful and well researched; however it's ultimately unhelpful.

Women are valued by their appearance, men are valued by their tax bracket. Even financially successful women do not marry down.

As a poor lonely man, regardless the time I spend in the gym, regardless my dancing skills, regardless my capacity to love, I'll always remain poor and lonely to the day I leave the world.

It's true society is visceral and shallow, but knowing it changes nothing.

Initially good and insightful. Easy to read. Was good up to snide antiTrump references that started to appear half way through. Stepping into politics really detracted from the message and I could not finish the book.

Wonderful book and beautifully written. Lost Connections does a great job of portraying modern society and linking causes within modern society to both causes and solutions of depression in the 21st century.

Someone recommended this book to me based on muni retest in psychology. It blew me away - I expected something railing against drugs for managing depression. It’s seems like a very real, practical approach for understanding and addressing. I really enjoyed it.

I would recommend that anyone who is taking medication skip the chapter on why the author thinks antidepressants don't work. In any case, do not stop taking any medication without your doctors knowledge and approval. Too dangerous.

I did like the chapters about modern life and how it is affecting our connections (or lack thereof) to each other. This is most of the book and the part I found most interesting and thought provoking.

Most of the research mentioned in this book is not new. But reading about it in a neatly organized way has a powerful effect that left me thinking. The author's personal journey makes it more interesting and approachable than a purely academic text.

This book doesn't promise to fix you, and it won't. It might offer some ideas, but the solutions are not simple, nor easy. The whole point of it is that self help is not enough. It's time we start helping each other.

Author has a well researched holistic view of the causes of anxiety and depression . Unfortunately, he throws in unnecessary and naive political comments about Trump and brexit. His solutions are seriously conflicted. He identifies the need for better values, community , love, and hope. Then he dismisses religion with "I am an atheist ", ignoring that what he thinks is needed can be found in Christian communities . He advocates for individuals to be able to be able to have control over their lives , then advocates for government to take control of advertising , health care, and income inequality .

Excellent book except author needs to keep his politics to himself and watch his mouth. There is no need to use that kind of language. I get all the bullcrap about politics that I can stand on TV and in News Paper articles. I don't care to hear any more. Left, Right, I don't care! He had great information to share, and put it together so we'll, I was impressed. Excellent writer and his audiobook, read by himself, the author was also very well done. I just have no need of foul language and politics. There are too many other sources for that crap out there. It ruined the otherwise exceptional job he did.
I have recommended this book to a few friends but gave them fair warning. I would have given him a 5-Stars rating if he would have been professional and stuck to the subject matter. It shows an emotional immaturity.

This could have been the most informative book on modern health. Anti-depressants are hell created by medicine to ensure we never get better! Name one person who was cured of depression by using Anti-Depressants? The author often strayed from the topic to give his own politics and perversion. For example; the author thought it was "fascinating" to watch a monkey masturbate itself. The title of the book should have been "How to be self centered and pretend to be important."

THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE BOOK TO WARN HUMANITY ABOUT THE HORROR OF ANTI-DEPRESSANTS. BUT INSTEAD WE GOT BOZO THE CLOWN!

Throw away all you're books on depression, this is the only book you will ever need, Well written with research all over the world. I loved the part about child trauma, parts about healing and people coming together. I learned a lot about myself in this book too. I have a different outlook on life now.

Thank you Good Reads for the free book for my honest review.

This should be a bestseller.

Cherie'

British Journalist and social justice warrior goes on a journey to investigate depression. He discovers social psychiatry and concludes that psychopharmacology is ineffective, and social treatment just fine. If you are depressed or anxious, it is not your fault. You are a victim of your circumstances. Rise up. Change the world. Get community; get connected. The contemporary world sucks. We need universal guaranteed income. Consider psychedelics and deep meditation. There is only a 30% chance that your brain is the root of your problem.

The book started out great. Seemed like the author's comments were backed by science. At about the middle of the book it went downhill and never recovered. Most of the reasons the author states for depression are common knowledge: 1) Working in a job you dislike or hate, 2) Not enough social interaction, 3) Valuing material stuff (extrinsic) over non-material stuff (intrinsic), 4) Not dealing with childhood trauma, 5) Loss of status and respect, 6) Lack of nature (someone wrote a whole book on this topic), 7) Feeling hopeless about the future, 8) genes, and 9) brain changes. However, he offered no real solutions unless you are willing to get involved in making major social changes. We should get rid of capitalism and create cooperatives where everyone is an owner in a company. We should remove all forms of external advertisement (signs, billboards, etc.) and not watch TV. If you are a doctor, you should spend time with your patients who are depressed and ask what happened to them in their life. You should get outside more. Governments should give universal guaranteed income to everyone as Obama wanted to do. Over and over he indicates how people are happier in socialistic and communistic countries. Well, maybe we should all move to Norway but since this is not realistic, what are the solutions because he offered few. What I didn't understand is why someone British is going door to door in the US to get the word out to stop Trump from becoming President and what does this have to do with depression. To sum it up, this book was more of a political book about how communism and socialism is better than capitalism. Glad I got the book from the library and didn't spend a cent on this garbage. In some ways the book may make more people depressed because what Hari advocates is unrealistic in the US. It might have been more helpful to suggest ways in which people can get more happiness out of their jobs or find another, how people can get more socialization into their lives, how people can become less materialistic, how people can deal with childhood traumas or seek help for them, how people can get out more in nature, and what realistic changes people can make to feel more hopeful about the future. He also didn't mention how lack of exercise and diet can influence depression. Exercise alone will help a significant amount of people. Eating junk food with all its chemicals and additives can cause or add to depression because of the nutritional deficiencies they cause. None of this was addressed. So what Hari wants you to do is gather together with other people (social contact) and work to make some major social changes like legislating for guaranteed income. Completely unrealistic.

Unfortunately this work of research leads the reader toward a promising result. after reading half of the book (which is well written and holds out hope of a solution) the author reveals that he is an Atheist. He then leads the reader toward the use of phsycidelic drugs to communicate with the dead and achieve "enlightenment".
A real disappointment if you hold a biblical perspective . Nothing is new here. If you are looking to solve your issues with depression I would recommend a very cautious reading of this work or don't waste your time.

He confirms everything I have been saying for as long as I can recall. My mom is a psychiatrist, and I have had/still have severe depression, anxiety, eating disorders. I’ve attempted suicide, been hospitalized twice, once for a month and had 12 sessions of ETC, which did nothing but wipe out many recent memories. Numerous psychiatrists have prescribed me combinations of various drugs. It only numbs. I honestly think those who are not depressed in today’s world are in denial or mentally ill themselves or have adapted to the emptiness and apathy toward humanity and selfish competiveness spawned by modern capitalism, which sounds fairly unhealthy. The pharmaceutical industry has turned doctors into highly trained and educated salespeople, especially in psychiatry. I’m not against taking medication, but it’s important to understand that you’re mostly expiericing a placebo effect if you are fortunate enough to feel remotely better; it doesn’t get to the root of the matter, and you’re still a hollow shell of a person going through the motions. Not to mention, if you’re paying for these drugs out of pocket, you’re being massively ripped off and are a willing victim of fraud. It’s disconcerting to see pillpushing psychiatrists get so defensive if anyone mentions an alternative to medication. My mother still wants me to get back on them, even though I was just as self-destructive on them as off and more numb with chronic brain fog. I may have just hid it better, or she was just desperately trying to convince herself that the magic chemical cocktail was working because it has to for the whole paradigm to make sense, and admitting that the treatments she stands by are useless if not plain harmful because they suppress true intuition and further invalidate and delegitimize what you know is genuine pain that may have led to the chemical imbalance but wasn’t caused by some random/inexplicable case of bad brain chemistry due to genetic factors. This creates the greater stigma and leads to more insecurity and anxiety because you trust the expert for a while at least, even though you know such a superficial treatment that lacks obvious logic could never work. Psychiatrists want to believe they are helping patients because they hand them a prescription after a 15 minute appointment (because they are such erudite healers, in their opinion), but they really represent the base of the extensive pryamid scheme funneling down from the top of the sinister pharmaceutical industry hierarchy, to the drug reps, to the doctors shilling the next, ground breaking placebo to another desperate patient willing to try anything to escape the very system that created the corporate, fascist, festering, exploitative structure that professes to want to “treat” them. It’s known that they can’t extract profits from those that are healed or at least aware of the scheme, so why does anyone believe these companies often subsidized by taxpayer money through grants want you well enough to not have to return to them for more. I used to think this sounded conspiratorial, but it’s really just common sense. Study Marxism; it often stirs that powerful feeling of solidarity as much as capitalism alienates. Feel pain; there is reason why it’s there. You’re chemicals are imbalanced for a deeper reason. Sorry for the rant. This book expresses what I’ve always understood and knew was being ignored by society. By pushing numbing agents, you’re allowing depression to thrive. I’m not advising to stop taking medication, just to evaluate it’s actual efficacy with a truly open mind. What is there to be thrilled about? War, genocide, poverty for the majority of the world, including the US, child trafficking/abuse, vast income inequality allowing unelected oligarchs to shape our reality in order to only benefit themselves, a despotic American empire (under every war criminal president we’ve had) that cannot face the fact that it is collapsing by it’s own doing? If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention. Hasten the collapse so we can have a much needed revolution and create a society that doesn’t kill the will to live by it’s very essence.

Johann Hari narrates his exploration of depression and anxiety, which leads him to central questions about what it means to live a happy life. It starts off as a riveting iconoclastic journey, but arrives at some puzzling conclusions.

First, the matters of fact: Hari's writing style is fair, but not brilliant. (He tends to overuse words like "patiently," and his imagery/metaphor is clearly forced). He often swears outside of quotations which, while inoffensive to me personally, does seem to lower the intellectual standard a mite. The "story" is of his own exploration, and as such lacks the scholastic rigor that an academic might hope for.

While Hari's research is usually impeccable, there are major flaws. His chapter relating evolutionary biology and depression is utterly pseudoscientific, failing to pass even the point of plausible anecdote. (At one point he claims that a majority of people prefer African "plains"-like terrain to anything else... sheesh).

Hari is politically left-wing, and it powerfully affects his interpretation of data. Spoiler alert: He ends up concluding that the solution to meaningless drone-work is for every business to run like a democratic collective, with no "bosses" (ewwww!) and shared profits. As an American - and a person with a working understanding of the business world - this is patently ridiculous. You can run a bike shop like this, but not a multi-billion-dollar drugstore chain.

This book contains precious insight into depression and anxiety, and occasionally stumbles into valid conclusions about what makes a happy life. Many of these are things we already know deep down: Relationships are key. Meaning is key. Materialism is empty. However, due to its banal political propaganda and obvious anti-traditionalist bent, I am unable to recommend it to many friends and family who would otherwise greatly benefit.

This is an outstanding book that challenges the most common treatment to depression and anxiety; pharmaceuticals. But it goes far beyond that and challenges the way many people are living their lives and covers many areas such as social media, materialism, meditation, being in nature, the importance of a strong social support system and hope for a strong future. So much value and things to ponder while reading this book. Outstanding for anyone raising kids and trying to build a healthy lifestyle for their family.

The author tackles the question of nature vs nurture (and current environment) when diagnosing depression, and comes down firmly on the side of nurture. This was a revelation for him because when he was diagnosed as a teenager, he was told it was 100% his brain that was the problem.

Like many converts, I think he's a little overzealous in his new stance. Reading this is like attending a sociology class. Nothing is genetics. Everything is the result of your environment. But depression is caused by a combination of these factors, something he talks about, yet somehow repeatedly claims he never, ever heard before. "What? It's not just a serotonin imbalance?"

This was an interesting and well-written book told through anecdotes about people he met and using studies to back up his conclusions, and I think the author does a decent job summarizing environmemtal factors associated with depression.

I have friends with bipolar, and to his credit, he briefly alludes to the fact that bipolar depression may be different. If you've ever seen someone in the grips of a manic episode, you wouldn't doubt it is the result of a chemical imbalance. Why is it so difficult to accept that some people may suffer from depression resulting from a similar type of imbalance, without the manic episodes?

The second two parts of the book are a good summary of the non-biological causes of depression, and he offers some proposed ways to fix them, both at the individual and societal level. He acknowledges there are no quick fixes.

It annoys me that throughout he keeps saying things like "if depression were just a serotonin imbalance, then why would having no friends matter?" He claims he was in therapy. If he ever thought it was just a serotonin imbalance, why was he in therapy? And what kind of terrible therapist didn't tell him friends help you when you're depressed?

The first section of the book explains how antidepressants are a big scam. He includes a chapter (way, way after the section where he debunks antidepressants) where he talks about how depression actually does alter your brain, making it difficult to lift yourself out of depression without help. So whether it was caused by social or biological problems, it doesn't seem too far-fetched by this logic that a pill may help in the short term. I'm not saying his studies are bad, but since I take issue with his premise that depression is completely environment-driven, the unspoken recommendation to quit makes me nervous. I'm definitely going to be looking into this more, though.

This book is a great distillation of why people get depressed and is easy to read. But it's written by a journalist, not a scientist, so take the medical advice with a pinch of salt.

LOST CONNECTIONS is a fascinating and important book on a subject that has reached epidemic proportions. People everywhere are experiencing major disconnections from family, friends and their own emotional life -- and paying a severe price. Johann Hari has done a brilliant job of analyzing the situation and showing us a better way forward. His book features interviews with several of the world's leading researchers on depression, great stories and just the right amount of personal narrative. Highly recommended for anyone who has ever personally suffered from depression or has a loved one who has.

There are moments of emotional resonance - especially when the author is describing the plight of his friend Angela - but for the most part this book is flat, unorganized, and offers little that is revelatory.

He does adequately make the case that causes of depression are more complex and human than what Big Pharma would like you to believe (the section on childhood trauma especially begins to hint at more of a traditional psychoanalytic approach to understand the unconscious) but he doesn’t go nearly far enough in addressing the myriad ways in which environmental experiences may impact psychological well-being.

The book really begins to wander with the sections on the squatters in Berlin, which is way too long, and not adequately integrated into his thesis.

The biggest disappointment is the last section which purports to deal with solutions for depression and falls woefully short.

In short this all could have used much more thinking, organizing, and editing.

The author is well intentioned and has experienced some success in his own life with the cooperative ventures into which he has entered. His assumption seems to be that issues can be worked out if a cooperative effort is made to avoid the alienation occasioned by the modern world. I'm glad for his success. He does a good job of highlighting the sources of much our modern day discontent. Having identified the source of today's angst and stress, I think he misses the source of its ultimate resolution. We need help from Someone greater than ourselves. Answers and solutions lie in the Spiritual realm. As it is written, "You can do nothing of yourselves." To miss this realization guarantees disappointment and frustration.

This is one of those books that has the potential to change your worldview on a topic; it's both a personal story of the author struggling to come to terms with his depression and a well-researched look at what are some of the more fundamental causes for it.

It's a book that everyone benefits from reading - not just people who have been directly or indirectly affected by depression. It paints a picture of a fundamentally broken society, and it does so based on "hard data".

Personally, I found the section on Nature to be rather weak compared to the other parts - this could stem from the author being a self-proclaimed urbanite. Luckily, the book "Nature Fix" more than fills in that gap and provides heaps more insights for that particular section.