Women and Depression: A Case Study of the Influence of Feminism in Canadian Psychology

Abstract

Evidence of the burden of depression for women worldwide and of the link between depression and the economic and social conditions of women’s lives provides a firm grounding for feminist-informed understandings of depression. We focus on the conjunction of women and depression as a site for assessing the influence of feminism in Canadian psychology. On the basis of our analysis of two ‘fact sheets’ - one on depression and one on postpartum depression - that appear on the website of the Canadian Psychological Association, we conclude that feminist-informed understandings of depression are almost completely absent in the accounts of depression presented to the public. We explore reasons for the resistance to such understandings through reference to psychology’s reliance on individualist conceptions and to the contemporary climate in which Canadian clinical psychology is located.