Describe and Evaluate Biological Explanations of Depression

Describe and evaluate biological explanations of depression There are many different explanations for depression, including biological. Links have been found between biochemical, genetics and hormonal imbalances with depressed people. In the biochemical explanation, a link has been found between neurotransmitter imbalances and depression. Serotonin is associated with pleasure and mood. Mann et al found impaired transmission of serotonin in people with depression. However Julian disagrees with this statement and says depression may be due to neuron damage rather than a neurotransmitter reduction.The problem with this approach is that it implies correlation and not causation, there may be a link but something else could be causing both depression and low serotonin. There is the chicken and egg problem – does low serotonin cause depression or does depression cause low serotonin? In other areas of psychology low serotonin has been linked with increased aggression and eating disord ers, as well as anxiety. Someone that has low serotonin does not necessarily become depressed. There is also the problem where people are depressed but have normal serotonin levels.This shows that depression is not fully down to biochemical imbalances but other things as well. It is a very simplistic and reductionist model and should only be included as a vulnerability and not the whole answer to depression. Another explanation is a genetic problem. Through many family studies Gershon states there is a clear inheritable component to depression, especially in bipolar disorder. Weisseman et al supports this by saying that for if a child has a parent with depression, the risk of the child having depression is increased by three times compared to the general population.This is a strong finding but as the children share the same environment as their parents, there is a possibility that the child has learnt the behaviour through the social learning theory of imitating and observing and no t through genetics. Kendler et al studied over 15000 twins in Sweden and found that if one twin has depression, there is a 38% chance that the other twin will have it too. This has strong methodology and is supported by many twin studies who have found similar results. On the other hand the twins share the same environment and so environmental influences may still be possible.The results were nowhere near 100% showing that depression is not fully down to genes, the people may have a genetic vulnerability but it takes something to trigger, perhaps. It is also unclear as to how exactly genes play a role in depression, without knowing the exact genes involved. Another way to access the significance of genes is through adoption studies. Wender found that a child is seven times more likely to have depression if the biological parents were depressed and the adoption parents were not.They found little evidence of depression being learnt. However Wender got his information about biological relatives just from hospital records and so there could be error of misdiagnosis or short-term depression only. The knowledge of whether a person has a genetic vulnerability to depression can be useful as the person is able to take preventative measures (change in lifestyle, diet to bring positivity to avoid depression), but it could be fatalistic as they understand they are more likely to become depressed – leading to depression.Diathesis-stress model says that depression can be better understood as an interaction between genes and environmental factors. Carroll found that high levels of the hormone cortisol are found in those suffering from depression and techniques known to suppress cortisol secretion have been found to be successful in depressive patients. However cortisol is released when stressed and so the high levels could be due to the high levels of stress the person has when they are depressed.As depression is twice as common in women as men, it could be due to the differences in sex hormones. Post-natal depression could be due to the high levels of oestrogen and progesterone that are released during pregnancy and then rapidly decrease once the baby is born which may account for an imbalance of hormones. Cooper disagrees with this statement as there was very little difference in the number of women suffering from depression after childhood and a control group of non-pregnant women at the same age.If imbalance of hormones was the cause then most mothers should get this type of illness but it is only a small number that get it. Menopausal depression is where oestrogen levels drop and hormone replacement therapy appears to be affective in treating many (but not all) women who suffer from this type of depression. However this could be due to the negative thoughts of getting older rather than the hormonal imbalance. Through the biological approach there are many possibilities. I think it is a mixture of biological vulnerabilities and stressful env ironments. Describe and Evaluate Biological Explanations of Depression Describe and evaluate biological explanations of depression There are many different explanations for depression, including biological. Links have been found between biochemical, genetics and hormonal imbalances with depressed people. In the biochemical explanation, a link has been found between neurotransmitter imbalances and depression. Serotonin is associated with pleasure and mood. Mann et al found impaired transmission of serotonin in people with depression. However Julian disagrees with this statement and says depression may be due to neuron damage rather than a neurotransmitter reduction.The problem with this approach is that it implies correlation and not causation, there may be a link but something else could be causing both depression and low serotonin. There is the chicken and egg problem – does low serotonin cause depression or does depression cause low serotonin? In other areas of psychology low serotonin has been linked with increased aggression and eating disord ers, as well as anxiety. Someone that has low serotonin does not necessarily become depressed. There is also the problem where people are depressed but have normal serotonin levels.This shows that depression is not fully down to biochemical imbalances but other things as well. It is a very simplistic and reductionist model and should only be included as a vulnerability and not the whole answer to depression. Another explanation is a genetic problem. Through many family studies Gershon states there is a clear inheritable component to depression, especially in bipolar disorder. Weisseman et al supports this by saying that for if a child has a parent with depression, the risk of the child having depression is increased by three times compared to the general population.This is a strong finding but as the children share the same environment as their parents, there is a possibility that the child has learnt the behaviour through the social learning theory of imitating and observing and no t through genetics. Kendler et al studied over 15000 twins in Sweden and found that if one twin has depression, there is a 38% chance that the other twin will have it too. This has strong methodology and is supported by many twin studies who have found similar results. On the other hand the twins share the same environment and so environmental influences may still be possible.The results were nowhere near 100% showing that depression is not fully down to genes, the people may have a genetic vulnerability but it takes something to trigger, perhaps. It is also unclear as to how exactly genes play a role in depression, without knowing the exact genes involved. Another way to access the significance of genes is through adoption studies. Wender found that a child is seven times more likely to have depression if the biological parents were depressed and the adoption parents were not.They found little evidence of depression being learnt. However Wender got his information about biological relatives just from hospital records and so there could be error of misdiagnosis or short-term depression only. The knowledge of whether a person has a genetic vulnerability to depression can be useful as the person is able to take preventative measures (change in lifestyle, diet to bring positivity to avoid depression), but it could be fatalistic as they understand they are more likely to become depressed – leading to depression.Diathesis-stress model says that depression can be better understood as an interaction between genes and environmental factors. Carroll found that high levels of the hormone cortisol are found in those suffering from depression and techniques known to suppress cortisol secretion have been found to be successful in depressive patients. However cortisol is released when stressed and so the high levels could be due to the high levels of stress the person has when they are depressed.As depression is twice as common in women as men, it could be due to the differences in sex hormones. Post-natal depression could be due to the high levels of oestrogen and progesterone that are released during pregnancy and then rapidly decrease once the baby is born which may account for an imbalance of hormones. Cooper disagrees with this statement as there was very little difference in the number of women suffering from depression after childhood and a control group of non-pregnant women at the same age.If imbalance of hormones was the cause then most mothers should get this type of illness but it is only a small number that get it. Menopausal depression is where oestrogen levels drop and hormone replacement therapy appears to be affective in treating many (but not all) women who suffer from this type of depression. However this could be due to the negative thoughts of getting older rather than the hormonal imbalance. Through the biological approach there are many possibilities. I think it is a mixture of biological vulnerabilities and stressful env ironments.

New Christian Right in US Politics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4250 words

New Christian Right in US Politics - Essay Example 29, 2011). Despite the fact that these campaigners looked like their republican as well as autonomous corresponding persons in quite a lot of respects, the representatives with Christian Right ties were not mainly successful and were unsuccessful to form an operational coalition with the majority republicans on the mission. The centre of the crisis was the continuance by the communal traditionalists of a ‘foreigner’ point of view that toughened their pedant point of reference to civic dealings (Culver & Dorhauer, p. 43, 2007). The Christian Right has attained considerable representation within American communal life. Even though this sort of demonstration may have presented significant representative advantages, the force to protect public agency was acceptable as the way towards putting a stop. The objective of the Christian Right, stating generally, has been to alter American public strategy in the way of what are known as family or conventional standards. Despite the fact that researchers have collected many statistics on the communal as well as electoral foundation of the faction, they have given very small amount of facts with reference to its impact on civic strategy (Ishay, p. 59, 2008). The fundamental issue is whether Christian Right leaders have made an unbeaten shift from ‘foreigner’ to ‘insider politics’, or if they stay traditionalists who have yet to change completely to the traditions of politics. The coalition between right-wing religious conviction and traditionalist politics had an extensive derivation in American political life, and the alliance would grow so long as it carried on to provide the concerns of both accomplices. Subsequent to a series of strategy failures throughout the presidency of its former enthusiast, the movement appeared to fall apart during the 1988 drive for the Republican presidential selection (Meyers, p. 193, 2006). As a number of the original tycoons who had driven the movement stepped out of political activities, quite a lot of researchers were fast to mark obituaries with reference to this latest fatality of America's determinedly incremental political structure. At base, the conversion of the Christian Right portrayed by supporters of the next generation concerned the progress grip on pluralism. In the pluralist assumption of American politics, the utter variety of clusters functional within the political structure mainly prevents fundamental alteration. In the pluralist point of view, the structure progresses by small strides, motivated mainly by stress from groups that can create a centre of attention for adequate supporters by logrolling as well as vote trading to make short-lived common coalitions. Faced with this cruel truth, movements that come into politics, in search for radical change have to reconcile instead for additional modification by implementing the standards of alliance formation as well as conciliation (Butler, p. 193, 2006). For that to take place, non-transferable requirements have to be substituted by negotiating as well as by taking trade-offs into consideration. The substitute is marginalization along with the political wilderness. NEW CHRISTIAN RIGHT At its core, the Christian Right was the interest group of ethical re-establishment that recognized settled as a ‘give in’

Marketing 521 - Discussion Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Marketing 521 - Discussion - Assignment Example Moreover, if the employees are made to perceive the organization positively, they become motivated to work in the organization increasing their productivity. The management of an organization may decide on the values and characteristics the organization wants the public to associate it with. When the desired values have been established, they should be translated in to appealing marketing language. The Public relation’s department should then popularize the values among the employees in the organization before publicizing it eternally. Ethics refer to the moral values and principles that guide a person in decision making (Brenkert, 2008). Several ethical issues exist in the field of marketing. Predatory pricing in developing countries by large corporations to drive out competition is an ethical issue. Through this pricing method, competitors are denied their livelihood by large organizations by being driven out of business. Price fixing is another illegal activity in marketing. This happens when traders conspire to regulate prices of commodities so as to remain at a particular level for their mutual benefits. They manipulate supply and demand so that prices favor their profitability. The consumers are left on the receiving side since they have no choice, but to buy commodities at the exaggerated

Business Environment and Strategic Management Assignment - 1

Business Environment and Strategic Management - Assignment Example This essay stresses that Nokia could use an alternative strategy for developing its activities. Instead of being relied on the financial support of Elop, the firm should try to update its strategies; a restructuring of the firm’s units could help to the limitation of the firm’s costs, in the context described above, and the stabilization of the firm’s performance. Moreover, following this practice, the firm could manage to develop its performance, even in the long term. In any case, as proved through the figures presented above – and through the relevant graphs – the problem of the firm is not its sales but its profits; in other words, there is no need for increasing sales – even if such perspective would be positive for the growth of the firm – but to increase the profits; in this context, there is an issue of update of the firm’s management strategies and not of improving the firm’s brand name or achieve other benefits that refer to the firm’s image in its market. This paper makes a conclusion that investing in Nokia would be strongly suggested. The firm is in a period of restructuring. For a while, its performance may be under pressure; however, in the long term, the improvement in the firm’s profitability can be considered as secured. Indeed, the initiatives developed by the firm’s new leader are expected to lead the firm to a significant growth, if taking into consideration its market share and its prospects having access to Android-based devices and iPhone.

Perspectives on Caring About Animals Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Perspectives on Caring About Animals - Essay Example Third, the book explains the human-animal bond (Davis 29).   The book explains that having pets generates a healthy environment. By having pets, the elderly person can be preoccupied with an activity that keeping boredom out of the home.  Ã‚   The book also shows the important of giving space to the animals to do their thing. Doing their thing includes sleeping, roaming around, feeding, self hygiene, and even mating. Impact.The book creates a great impact on my current knowledge about pet care (Davis 57). The book adds significant knowledge to my daily preparation pet nutrition. The book enumerates the vitamin and mineral requirements of my favorite pet dog. My application of the book’s food discussion has generated big results. My pet dog had metamorphosed from a lazy sleepy dog to a more active and playful ball retriever. Whenever I play catch the ball game, my pet dog runs faster, higher, and whoops (dog sound) more excitedly. The nutrition part of the book has allowed my pet dog to have more playing time. After feeding my dog the necessary vitamin and other energy-boosting food requirements, my pet dog’s energy  Ã‚   has quadrupled. Research Perspectives.     The book greatly contributes to my research perspectives (Davis 29). The book adds to my current knowledge about pet care. The book rejects many of the traditional ways of caring for animals. Many of the traditional ways are not medically approved by the authorized pet care authority, Medical Veterinarian.   The book discusses the social values about pets (Davis 137).

Consultancy advice for the supplynetwork and process Essay

Consultancy advice for the supplynetwork and process - Essay Example It therefore recommends the direct delivery of customized orders to clients from Bang & Olufsen's headquarters through a fast and trusted airlifting courier service. Also, it recommends the use of strong and reliable forecasting techniques to ensure that the demand for small and mass produced items are monitored in the various retail outlets around the world and shipments made at the right time to prevent shortages. The consultant also recommends the formation of a Design/Innovation Management unit in Bang & Olufsen to help in the integration of IdeaLab as a emergent as well as a primary/pure innovation unit. This way, IdeaLab can live above the conflicts and become a major player in Bang & Olufsen without going through too much conflicts. Supply Network Design There is the need for the design of a new supply network design. This new design and this new network must focus on customizing and supplying directly to the small niche of customers who account for over 70%. It should also fo cus on improving the shop design system for the large segment of customers who buy single items or in smaller quantities. Large/Customized Buyers The new supply network design must seek to always keep in touch with these customers and get an idea of what they want and prepare their positions to order the right type and volume of stocks to produce from these customers at a short notice. This can be done by using the customer relations management system to communicate regularly with the customers and find out their concerns. Once this kind of information can be ascertained, various units of the customization system can be mobilized to take the right steps even before orders are taken. Based on this forecast system, components can be ordered and delivered in anticipation of demand. In cases where the forecast show longer periods between orders, the plant in Koprivnice and on site should be programmed to be able to put the vital components together in the shortest period of five days so that they can be obtained just when they are needed. The Assembling department should maintain its production period of 1 day to ensure that all order details and quality functions are met so that the reputation of Bang & Olufsen remains intact. However, it is recommended that the use of retail outlets be eliminated from the process. It is ideal that the headquarters in Denmark maintains a direct link with these larger consumers and ship directly to them without using retail outlets. This will reduce the lead time between the consumers and the retail outlets for larger clients. It is also recommended that Bang & Olufsen uses a fast and reliable courier company that has a global reach for shipment of customized goods. An ideal courier company is one that uses airlines to move goods from one point to the other over all the continents. If this arrangement is in place, orders can be taken and assembled in one day and shipped upon arrival at the customer center. This will eliminate the one day waiting period at the customer center and the three days of transit to the retail outlets. This will save the customers a four-day period of waiting! In summary, the following supply network systems must be adopted for large buyers and customized orders: 1. Large orders should be directly sent to the global headquarters as soon as it is made anywhere in the world. 2. The assembling plant must always ensure that components for goods in demand are always in stock and there is a production cycle for that. 3. Shipping should be made directly from the headquarters to customized clients through the use of a global courier with a good reputation of delivery quickly. Smaller/Mass Produced Orders Although Bang & Olufsen head office will try to eliminate

The Development Quantum Computing Essay Example for Free

The Development Quantum Computing Essay The story of computers started with the abacus invented by the Babylonians around 500 B. C. In 1614 John Napier began to develop mechanical computers such as the Babbage differential engine that could carry out one fixed problem to the accuracy of 20 decimal places using steam power. This is a picture of the left side of the Manchester Mark 1 computer, which was constructed in 1947. However, computing didnt advance until the introduction of vacuum tube powering in the early 20th century and transistors in 1947. At present computers work by manipulating bits, that can only be of discrete values of 1 or 0. In a digital computer the value of a bit is generated by the voltage on a capacitor, with a charged capacitor representing 1 and an uncharged capacitor denoting 0. According to Moores law the number of transistors in computer chips doubles every 18 months and computers have been seen to double in speed and half in size every two years, this is due to advanced lithography that allows wires and transistors contained in chips to be one hundredth of the width of a human hair These computers can carry out calculations using algorithms, a precise set of instructions used to solve a particular problem, an example of a fast or usable algorithm is addition and a slow or hard algorithm is factorisation. There a limits to present computers, that cant seem to be overcome by present technology. Hard algorithms like factorisation increase in time taken to solve exponentially when the number of digits increase, factorising a 400 digit number would take the most technologically advanced computer a billion years to perform. Computers have also reached their present size boundaries as transistors and wires cant be decreased to less than a width of an atom. (Approximately 10? 10 meters) The dawn of quantum computers In 1982 Richard Feynman began to consider the idea of quantum computers and in 1985 a revolutionary paper was published by David Deutsch of Oxford university, describing a universal quantum computer, however a use for quantum computers couldnt be found, until 1994 when Peter Shor from ATTs Bells laboratories devised a quantum algorithm that could theoretically perform efficient factorisation, creating a killer application for quantum computers for their great potential to break complex codes, for example electronic bank accounts, which gain their security from the present difficulty in factorising large numbers. What a Quantum computer can do for you In order to continue the advance in computing a new type of technology needed to be exploited. According to quantum physics a subatomic particle cant be said to exist, there are only probabilities of its existence and position until its definite state and position is discovered, then its probabilities collapse. Quantum physics breaks down the classically binary nature of a bit, with the invention of a quantum bit or qubit that can exist in coherent superposition, i. e. as a 0, 1 or simultaneously as a 1 and 0, with a numerical coefficient representing the probability of each state. The qubit is represented by the nuclear spins of each individual atom, for example the change in energy state. When you perform a calculation using an electron existing in both states you are performing two calculations, when another superposed qubit is added four calculations can be performed at once and so on. This exponential increase means that the time taken to carry out calculations rapidly decreases. The time to carry out calculations also decreases as atoms change energy states far quicker than even the fastest computer processors. With only a few hundred qubits it is possible to represent more numbers than there are atoms in our universe. It also increases storage capacity exponentially, as N qubits can store 2 numbers at once. Imagine the qubits are atoms whose different electronic states can be controlled by a tuned laser; this will change their state allowing in only one computational step a calculation to be performed on 2 different input numbers encoded in coherent superpositions of N qubits. The actual space a quantum computer will take up will be significantly smaller than present day desk tops, allowing the further development of sophisticated, efficient palm held computers. This is because given the right calculation each qubit can take the place of an entire processor, meaning that 100 barium ions could take the place of 100 computer processors. Aside from computers quantum technology has developed rapidly in the last ten years. In June 2002 a team of Australian scientist were able to teleport a laser beam, causing it to disappear and be regenerated 3 ft away, the results are yet to be confirmed but if they are sound this development could in a matter of years be able to teleport actual objects significant distances. Nuclear Magnetic Resonance After Shors discovery quantum computing construction began in earnest, however due to the phenomena of decoherence no atom or photon, being the qubit, can be of an undetermined state after being detected, the probabilities collapse and its state becomes definite. This makes further calculations impossible as the exponential element of the qubit has been lost, causing it to behave as a regular analogous bit. In order to keep the coherence of the qubit the inner workings of a quantum computer must be separate from the outside environment to stop any interactions that may determine the state of the qubit from occurring, but also be accessible so that calculations can be carried out and results obtained. A solution was Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) a technique developed in the 1940s, which is widely used in medical imagery and chemistry. Experiments were carried out, during the mid 1990s and it was found using a classical fluid made of many (1023) selected molecules allowed each qubit to be represented by many molecules allowing interactions to take place between some of the molecules but still maintaining the coherence of the qubit. NMR treats the spins of qubits as tiny bar magnets that will line up when a magnetic field is applied, allowing manipulation of the qubits. Two alternative alignments are generated one parallel to the external field and one anti-parallel to the field, corresponding to two different quantum states. NMR procedures also use an oscillating electromagnetic field, which is specially selected according to the properties of the molecules used. This causes certain spins in the liquid to be rotated, causing them to perform the different calculations required. Example Hydrogen nuclei placed in a magnetic field of 10 tesla, change orientation at a frequency of 400 megahertz (radio frequency) Due to decoherence the pulse is only turned on for a few millionths of a second but can cause the spins to rotate by 180 degrees, a pulse half that length causes a 90 degree spin. This causes the spins to be of state 1 or 0 with equal probability. This causes the spin to rotate about the magnetic field, as shown in the image on the right. This rotation emits a weak radio signal, which is picked up by the NMR apparatus.