The Mega Marketing Of Depression Essay

According to research published in The American Journal of Psychiatry, major depression rates for American adults increased from 3.33 percent to 7.06 from 1991 to 2002. “Depression (major depressive disorder) is a common and serious medical illness that negatively affects how you feel, the way you think and how you act”(Parekh). Although some may believe that depression is stagnant, more Americans are in fact dealing with depression than in years prior. I heard this and was unsettled. In a time of openness and greater opportunity than ever before, why is depression increasing in Americans? My research has lead to the conclusion that social media, the modernization of western culture, and the average American diet has been leading factors in

"Men pray to the gods for health and they ignore that it is in their power to have it."

In Ethan Watters’ essay, “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan,” he has a discussion with Dr. Laurence Kirmayer regarding Kirmayer’s invitation to the International Consensus Group on Depression and Anxiety. In their discussion Kirmayer talks about how the basis of his invitation was on the notion that he as the director of the Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry at McGill could add to the answer the large pharmaceutical giant, GlaxoSmithKline was looking for. The question at hand was how culture influences the illness experience, but more specifically how depression is influenced by culture in Japan. If the conference was a success, the company would be able to enter and expand into a market worth billions of dollars. The reason that the cultural aspect of depression was very important was because in countries like Japan, the American conception of depression was taken as a more serious illness, rivaling heights of diseases like schizophrenia. The company hoped that by somehow changing the Japan’s perception of the illness from being something social or moral to the American conception where expressing the illness to others is considered being strong person rather than being a weak one, that their drug Paxil would be able to sell to the market, which is where the scientific and economic aspects of depression come into effect. The scientific and economic aspects take place due to the intentions of the company to sell the drug, and the drug’s ability to help

In this rapidly globalizing world, the jobs of the advertisers and marketers are to make sure we, the general public, have no control over our wants and desires. However, it is impossible for them to gain full control, but they do a good job of restricting what freedoms we do have. Big companies want us to believe that we have control by changing cultural norms without us realizing they did. Ethan Watters discusses how marketers plan to redesign Japanese culture for their benefit in his narrative titled “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan.” Watters makes it clear big companies, such as the drug company GlaxoSmithKline, are reshaping Japanese culture to market a pill that supposedly cures depression. Society is constantly changing and companies are able to take advantage of that by prompting the route in which society chooses to take. Large companies practice this style of marketing everywhere in the world and they are successful in influencing us, the general public. Big companies are considered big because consumers continuously buy their products, a lot of which are unnecessary. Their success brings light to the fact that we may believe that we have control, but it is just an illusion.

Predetermined realities are realities that people blindly accept and inhabit as their own. These false realities constrict the expression of life by clouding an individual’s purpose and guiding them to live systematically. Too often individuals neglect to navigate their lives around their own wants, beliefs and values. Instead of making independent decisions, decisions are made based on the opinions or pressures from others, suppressing one’s authentic reality with societal norms. These norms and expectations set forth by authorities inadvertently transform an individual’s reality into an unoriginal, predetermined reality. In other words, there is an infinite number of aesthetically eccentric views, but we are given binoculars to only focus on what others want us to see. Unfortunately, these societal interferences are nearly unavoidable. Cathy Davidson’s essay, “Project Classroom Makeover,” presents how the enforcement of mundane standardization in American education systems leads to the decrease of original talents and creativity. Similarly, Ethan Watters’ essay, “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan,” portrays the ways in which pharmaceutical companies attempt to standardize depression, shifting the reality of an entire culture, for the sake of their profit. Lastly, in “The Mind’s Eye,” Oliver Sacks illustrates how reality differs between individuals by using stories from individuals with blindness. Evidently, reality is in the

In ‘The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan”, Ethan Watters exemplifies a unique phenomenon in his work on the idea of cultural change in Japan. Watters essay discusses how a nation was altered for the benefit of industry through the use of marketing. The stance that Watters takes in his essay makes abundantly clear the implications of marketing and its techniques which can be used to change the thinking of an entire country. Karen Ho’s essay “Biographies of Hegemony” focuses on how the leaders of investment bankers market the ‘success’ in investment banking in an attempt to make students get involved in the banking career. Both of these ideas of modifying a system are joined together by the subliminal nature of techniques used in marketing, a system evident in both Watters’ and Ho’s essays. Before scrutinizing how marketing influences different groups of people, we have to first understand the type of marketing used in these texts. Primarily, the notion of mega-marketing has to be understood— marketing in a way that changes the ‘total environment’ (every aspect of the environment, from the government to the public) of the country. This general idea of changing the environment is the most commonplace marketing strategy, and is evident in both texts from Ho and Watters. With this logic, one can understand how such an influential change can define the exact relationship between investment bankers and ivy league students.

In the ever-expanding world today, consumers are becoming increasingly vulnerable to the ploys of mass media advertising and pharmaceutical companies alike. Ethan Watters in “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan” delves into the dangers of the globalization of a mentality for depression that seeks to transcend cultural values and traditions completely. Pharmaceutical companies, proponents of globalization, aim to eliminate the social and natural confines of a disease like depression, and instead, establish a medical model that is rigidly enforced through marketing and challenging existing cultural norms. Drug corporations continually bombard the general public with drugs that can cure ailments that supposedly afflict them, even if they are not indeed suffering from them. Therefore, a question arises, how much of what we perceive of the world around us is truly accurate and untainted by external influences? On the surface, corporations present themselves as benefactors of society working for the grace of the people; in reality, they are after the mighty dollar and strive to exploit new markets for product distribution. Every culture is unique in its explanatory reasoning for various circumstances and events that occur in the population, ranging from mental health to a general outlook on life. It is a travesty that cultures undergo unnecessary changes that can alter their very nature for the sake of monetary gain. Since cultural background shapes the conception of the

Wilson further argues that the need of understanding the impacts of cultural forces, because it affects how individuals cultural traits that interpret their views and beliefs. Professor Thompson shares the example of how women continually having children out of wedlock, which is evidence of how their cultural impacts how they interpret their reality. These patterns will continue to happen with communities if the cultural, in which they live in, does not change.

Media serves as a dictator, almost forcing society to shape around the brainwashing effect of advertisement. Society shields itself behind a thin wall they call individualism. They promote everyone being individuals and thinking for themselves when in reality, it’s the media who is lurking over the shoulder of society, whispering the rights and wrongs in the way we think and act. It’s the effect of media on society that sets that rulebook for what is considered the “well-being” of a person, both physically and emotionally. Ethan Watters supports this idea through his narrative, “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan” (512-532). He explains how Western society has been imposing on the culture of

Humankind is always making improvements. Fire was discovered for warmth, and now humans have heaters that keep them even warmer. The shadows told people what time of the day it was, and now it can be found out instantly by looking at phones or watches. Many innovations have a positive impact on humans. However, there are some cases where it is not, or at least there isn’t a black-or-white categorization for it. These ideas can be seen through the close reading of the essays “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan” by Ethan Watters, which focuses on the progress of the company GlaxoSmithKline spreading their antidepressants, and “The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food” by Michael Moss, which focuses on the progress of the quality

Conceptions of “health” and “illness” have been shaped by cultural beliefs, which is why the definitions of these two expressions have been so difficult to understand, even today. The meaning of “health” and “illness” is constantly changing due to how each culture defines it, how an individual experiences it, and how it is used in the marketing world. Now, in the 21st century, the meaning of health described by every country is generally an individual’s body in good condition, while illness is a sickness that affects the individual’s body. However, Ethan Watters’ “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan” compares depression and health and illness to show how there is not one specific classification to define what is truly means.

This paper introduces a 35-year-old female who is exhibiting signs of sadness, lack of interest in daily activities and suicidal tendencies. She has no interest in hobbies, which have been very important to her in the past. Her lack of ambition and her suicidal tendencies are causing great concern for her family members. She is also exhibiting signs of hypersomnia, which will put her in dangerous situations if left untreated. The family has great concern about her leaving the hospital at this time, fearing that she may be a danger to herself. A treatment plan and ethical considerations will be discussed.

feelings can linger for years. Depression is a social disorder characterized by a depressed mood

Culture is constantly changing and evolving over time, as it changes it characterizes its values, laws, beliefs, norms and views, amidst many other things, giving new interpretation to society. An individual’s life choices and opportunities, however, are not only shaped by their family and cultural formalities but also by their role in the society that surrounds them. I have decided to examine my father, Michael, and the influence his religion, family roles, societal norms and gender had in creating his place within society and decisions he’s made in life.

The term depression is widely misused in today’s society. All human beings experience periods in life where they are sad for a relatively short period of time, which is considered normal. Those who experience sadness for extended periods may be suffering from depression. Two terms used to reference the classifications of depression, are Major Depressive Disorder, and Dysthymia. Individual diagnosis of these classifications is dependent on the length of time, and severity of symptoms experienced by the individual. The causes for these depressive states can be due to genetics or the insufficient production of neurotransmitters, which provide the brain with the data necessary to regulate one's psychological well being. Two examples