I chose the topic of Mood Disorders to research for many reasons. I'm always hearing phrases such as "They're manic depressant"� and many more which interest me to research about these disorders. Mood disorders are broken down into two general categories, depression and bipolar disorder. When researching mood disorders, I've realized the meaning of all these phrases I've heard.

Depression is the most common of all psychological disorders. It effects more than 100 million people worldwide. Between 8 and 18% of the general population will experience depression in their lifetime. Research has proved that in any 6-month period, 8% of woman, and 4% of men are likely to be diagnosed with some form of depression. Hirshfield and Goodwin (1988) say that as many as 15% of severely depressed individuals eventually kill themselves.

Major Depression can be found in many people by the following symptoms.

~ Persistent depressed mood for most of the day.

~ Loss of interest in all or almost all activities.

~ Significant weight loss or weight gain due to changes in appetite.

~ Sleeping more or less than usual.

~ Speeding up or slowing down of physical and/or emotional reactions.

~ Fatigue or loss of energy.

~ Reduced ability to concentrate or make meaningful decisions.

~ Recurrent thoughts of death and/or suicide.

If you or anyone you know posses five or more of these nine traits, they are most likely going through major depression. The biggest solution to the depressed person is to seek help. There are many drugs out there that can help your exact situation enormously. Not only are their drugs, but doctors, therapists and even groups that deal with your exact medical condition.

The other condition is called Bipolar Disorder (manic depression). This is when you experience dramatic ups and downs in your mood. Periods of mania can change into depression very quickly for no reason at all. You may appear highly excited, act silly or even just argumentative. You also may experience hallucinations, and may be delirious. The characteristics of this disorder are:

~ Inflated self esteem

~ Inability to sit still or sleep restfully

~ Pressure to keep talking and switching from topic to topic

~ Racing thoughts "Flight of Ideas"�

~ Difficulty concentrating

Another trait that you may engage in is impulsive behaviors, such as wild spending sprees, quitting your jobs to fulfill your life long dreams and making foolish business investments.

Psychoanalytic scientists believe that these "depressed"� people have suffered a real or imaginary loss of a loved object or person in their childhood. The child feels anger toward the lost object or person, but instead of expressing the anger, they take it in internally and direct it to themselves. They begin to feel guilty and you sense a loss of self-esteem. This leads to depression.

People prone to depression have learned through experience to believe that previous events in their lives were out of control. This leads them to expect the future events will be out of their control as well. Whenever a negative event occurs, people feel helpless and lonely. This also leads to depression.

On the other hand, some people are prone to depression because of their habitual life style of explaining life events. Different types of explanations are: internal (blaming yourself) and external (blames something else, never yourself) , stable (tell yourself the problem can be changed) and unstable (tell yourself the problem is only temporary) , global ( problem is way too large to deal with)and specific (problem is small enough to be manageable).

According to Aaron Beck (1976), he says that people who are depressed have a negative view of themselves, their experiences, and their future. People have negative self-schemas from negative experiences in early childhood.

The biological view of mood disorders are more likely to occur in the close relative of affected individuals than in regular population. Identical twins are more likely to have the same mood disorder as compared to fraternal twins, also 20-25% of people who have mood disorders have a relative with a similar disorder.

In conclusion Mood disorders effects more than 100 million people worldwide. This is a disease that might not be looked at too seriously, but when in fact it's very serious matter that should be handled correctly. Statistics show that over 15% of severely depressed people eventually commit suicide, do you want that to be someone you know? Or even you?