We are taught to be nice and spread kindness. We are also taught to believe that kindness and consideration will be appreciated. However, a new study indicates that being nice may not do us any favours down the line. According to a study published in the journal, Nature Human Behavior, people who are nice—defined as sensitive to unfairness or inequity—are more likely to show symptoms of depression than people who tend to be selfish and egotistical.
For research purposes, lead author Dr Masahiko Haruno and a team of researchers looked at whether the pattern of thinking that’s considered 'pro-social' (meaning self-sacrificing and willing to promote equity) was linked with longer-term clinical symptoms of depression. The researchers also then followed up with a common depression questionnaire called the Beck Depression Inventory to see whether these patterns of brain activity were linked with depression symptoms within the prior two weeks. Turns out that having a pro-social pattern of brain activation was associated with more depression. The dynamic remained true when researchers followed up with participants a year later. According to the researchers, nicer people are more vulnerable to depression because they are more likely to experience extreme empathy, guilt and stress. And this emotional sensitivity is wired into the deepest and most automatic regions of the brain—places that are easy triggers for depression. Fortunately, not all hope is lost for inherently kind people. Dr. Mauricio Delgado, a neuroscientist at Rutgers University, said, “Although the average pro-social may have a sensitive amygdala—and hippocampus, the other primal stress-related brain region in the study, there are plenty of other higher-order brain regions involved in depression, including the prefrontal cortex, a brain region associated with regulation of these automatic feelings.”
By training higher-level brain processes (like the pre-frontal cortex) through talk therapy and pro-social, you can learn to control and combat more primal emotions. And the more you can use the pre-frontal cortex to tamp down amygdala-driven stress, the less likely you are to fall into depression.