Angelos Sofocleous

In this thesis, I conduct a phenomenological investigation of the intricate and often perplexing dimensions of experiences of depression, with a specific focus on disruptions that occur in the interpersonal relationships of depressed individuals. Central to this exploration are key facets of the subjective experience of depression, such as the pervasive sense that depression manifests as an unhomelike state of being-in-the-world. Within this framework, I analyse first-person depression accounts which report both that the experience of depression cannot be effectively articulated or described in ordinary language, and that other people cannot understand the experience of depression unless they have experienced it themselves. In doing so, I examine the disrupting implications of such reports for depressed individuals’ interpersonal relationships. An additional aspect of the experience of depression which I explore in this thesis concerns claims in the literature which support that the experience of depression is characterised by a complete loss of mood and a total loss of attunement to other people and the world. In evaluating these claims, I argue that the depressed individual, as a mooded being, retains the ability to attune to the world in distinct ways. Within this context, I further suggest that we can characterise the depressed individual’s world-experience as spectatorial - that is, as involving the sense of spectating toward other people actualising worldly possibilities which the depressed individual cannot actualise herself. In this respect, I propose that the metaphor of being a spectator in the world can illuminate other kinds of metaphors that individuals use to describe their experience such as “suffocating”, “incarcerated”, or “living in a bubble”. In this regard, via the metaphor of being a spectator, I introduce the distinction between possibilities-for-others and possibilities-for-me, which elucidates the depressed individual’s lack of connection to other people and belonging in the world. In these terms, through a comprehensive analysis of first-person accounts of depression, I argue that phenomenology can provide us with a nuanced and thorough understanding of disruptions that occur in depressed individuals’ interpersonal relationships.

This article critically examines the diagnostic criteria for Major Depressive Disorder as presented in the DSM-5-TR, with a particular focus on the symptoms of ‘depressed mood’ and ‘psychomotor agitation or retardation’. While existing literature in both humanistic psychology and phenomenological psychopathology has highlighted the limitations of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) symptom-based and externalist model, this article contributes to the discussion by grounding its critique in first-person accounts and by analysing how the aforementioned symptoms, as conceptualised in the DSM, flatten and obscure the lived experience of depression. It argues that the symptom of ‘depressed mood’ is conceptually circular and diagnostically imprecise, while ‘psychomotor agitation or retardation’, insofar as it is diagnosed based on being ‘observable by others’, fails to capture the phenomenological nuances of the experience, such as the loss of volition. Such limitations point to the need for an approach that takes seriously the lived, first-person dimensions of depression, rather than reducing the experience to externally verifiable signs. In this regard, by advancing a symptom-specific critique grounded in phenomenology, this article calls for a more person-centred approach to psychiatric diagnosis, one that considers the role of first-person experience. Finally, this article reflects on the implications of a person-centred approach for the evaluation of psychotropic medication, especially with regard to experiential phenomena such as depersonalisation and derealisation.

This article explores the temporal disturbances experienced in depression and the potential effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions in addressing these disturbances. Drawing upon a Husserlian framework, this article examines the three temporal phases of experience: retention, primal impression, and protention. These phases constitute the temporal fusion that allows us to perceive an event as a temporally extended event, encompassing the past, present, and future. In depression, the sense of anticipation and the belief in the potential for positive change are diminished, leading to a perception of the future as static and unchangeable, hence resembling the past. Depressed individuals also encounter disruptions in their experience of the past, as past thoughts resurface in consciousness at the present moment, further hindering the individuals’ ability to conceive of an open future where things could improve in meaningful ways. Mindfulnessbased interventions offer a pathway for detachment from rumination and restoration of the perception of the present and future as contingent and filled with possibilities. By focusing on the present moment and cultivating awareness of experiences in each present “now,” individuals can experience the present as fused with the past and the future.