Men's Depression

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Pollack has proposed criteria for a "male type" of major depressive disorder. Some of the proposed signs of depression in men include a tendency to become over-involved with work activities, avoidance of help, and increase of angry outbursts, and denial of sadness.¹ A recent qualitative study on men's depression found that men's experiences with depression included both typical symptoms (as described in the DSM-IV-R) and atypical symptoms such as alcohol or substance abuse, escalating interpersonal conflict, and anger management problems.² For most participants in the study, life changes, transitions, and losses of interpersonal connections triggered symptoms of depression and their attempts to hide their depressive symptoms appeared to make their depression worse.²

References

1. Pollack, W. S. (1998). Mourning, melancholia, and masculinity: Recognizing and treating depression in men. In W. Pollack & R. Levant (Eds.), New Psychotherapy for Men (pp. 147-166). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
2. Chuick, C. D., Greenfeld, J. M., Greenberg, S. T., Shepard, S. J., Cochran, S. V., & Haley, J. T. (2009). A qualitative investigation of depression in men. Psychology of Men & Masculinity, 10(4), 302-313.