Psychological aspects of depression

Depression is by far the most common of psychiatric disorders, accounting for 75% of all psychiatric hospitalizations. Each year more than 100 million people worldwide develop clinically recognizable depression, an incidence ten times greater than that of schizophrenia. Furthermore, during the course of a lifetime, it is estimated that 25% of the general population will experience at least one debilitating episode of depression. In addition to the enormous economic costs of this disorder in terms of lowered productivity, job absenteeism, and permanent withdrawal from the work force, there is also inestimable social damage: grief and pain, marital and family conflict, physical illness and death.