Healthy Skepticism Library item: 663

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

Nikelly AG.
Drug advertisements and the medicalization of unipolar depression in women.
Health Care Women Int 1995 May-Jun; 16:(3):229-42

Abstract:

Unipolar depression occurs twice as frequently among women as among men, and the pharmacological industry maintains a massive advertising campaign that encourages psychiatric professionals to rely on antidepressant medication as the solution to this problem. The pictorial content of drug advertisements shows women as victims of depression. The social problems and situational stresses associated with unipolar depression are never shown, and depression is assumed to be a personal and biological illness, its etiology decontextualized. In these advertisements, women are not offered a choice between medical and nonmedical treatment and are not empowered to become more active participants in their health decisions. Therapists are urged to become alert to this oversimplification.

Keywords:
*analysis images in ads women psychotropic drugs depression EVALUATION OF PROMOTION: JOURNAL ADVERTISEMENTS IMAGES IN PROMOTION: WOMEN INFLUENCE OF PROMOTION: MEDICALIZATION OF PROBLEMS PROMOTION IN SPECIFIC THERAPEUTIC AREAS: PSYCHIATRIC DISEASES