Shankar Vedantam

And this natural, healthy adaptation to experience fear, to be wary of threats, now gets put into hyperdrive because we are in an environment that is constantly pressing that button over and over again.

Is that the point that you're making?

So here again, the problem might not be social comparison per se, because again, as you point out, in our ancestral environments, perhaps some social comparison was useful.

If somebody figured out how to build a better hut than your hut, then you learned to build a better hut yourself.

But now we're confronted with social comparison with millions of other people, people who are better athletes, people who are eating nicer dinners, people who are in happier relationships.

And we're constantly asking ourselves the question, why is it that I have fallen short

short.

You also observed, John, that our modern culture leads people to pursue happiness in ways that may set themselves up for unhappiness.

What do you mean by this?

Can you talk a moment, John, about how in the United States we've actually written the pursuit of happiness into one of our foundational documents?

What do you think that does to our mental states?

Our culture has embraced the idea that depression is a sign of something broken within us.

But John's research in affective signs suggests that depression might emerge from the same mood system that helps us to adapt and survive.

When we come back, writing a new story about depression, one that offers greater understanding and hope.

You're listening to Hidden Brain.

I'm Shankar Vedantam.

This is Hidden Brain.

I'm Shankar Vedanta.

Psychologist John Rottenberg studies depression and where it comes from.

Use the subject line depression.