Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

Able-Emotion4416 t1_ivb0b7k wrote

There are now tons of studies showing that it isn't necessarily an individual problem for the vast majority of people suffering from mental health. But a huge systemic and societal one. Studies after studies demonstrate that air quality is crucial to prevent depression and anxiety, that most homes and buildings have neurotoxic offgasing, that out-door air qualities in cities is even worse. And that the probability to suffer from depression and anxiety in this environment strongly increases. Same thing with artificial lighting, junk food, and lack of physical exercises...

It's time to work and intervene like animal biologists do. It's time to fix our environment and food. And make them suitable for human mental and neurological health, among others.

Time to choose building materials, food ingredients, and artificial lighting that enhance human health, not harm it. And really time to strongly improve outdoor air quality in cities... We can't continue to make individual people carry the costs and burden of grave societal mistakes...

1

dude2dudette t1_ivb3d62 wrote

Behavioural/environmental mechanisms are certainly important. However, that doesn't exclude neurotransmitter mechanisms.

It could be that the environment causes neurotransmitter receptor activation changes (e.g., lived environment (work stress/poor living space/lack of exercise, etc.) modifying one's immune system could lead to opioid activation dysfunction, which could then lead to depressive symptoms - see Charles, Farias and Dunbar, 2020)

1