Video: Modern Contributors to Depression

Dr. Weil discusses how our lives are affected by a variety of influences which can cause depression. From the types of foods we eat to our daily interactions with others changing the way we live can affect how we feel.

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Video Transcript: Modern Contributors to Depression

Many things have changed, our lives have become frantic, and we’re subject to information overload. We’ve become much more socially isolated. Ours diets have changed; people are now eating industrialized food-like products. We’re more sedentary. So I think there are lots of things that may contribute to what’s happening. Social isolation is very big. One of the examples I used in the book is that when I grew up in Philadelphia in the late 1940s, early 1950s, I grew up in a row house and this was before air conditioning, and on hot nights everyone on the block was sitting out on the front steps and talking and this was a real community. When air conditioners came in, it was possible to stay in our houses and I think that a lot of the conveniences of modern life have enabled us to stay in our own little cocoons. I think that is much worse now with the Internet and all the new media. So I think a lot of things about contemporary living have made us much more isolated socially.