Casual gaming may not be a term you have heard before, but it is becoming a big trend throughout the world and the US. It basically refers to games that can be played for a short time with simple goals and sometimes quite addictive gameplay. I know what you are thinking. FarmVille, Facebook’s most notorious game, that sucks people in like a vacuum cleaner. Well, yes, those certainly qualify as casual, but what researchers were looking at was more things like match 3 games (which are puzzles of a sort), hidden object games (where players look for items disguised in a picture) and others. WildTangent.com and BigFishGames.com, among many others, have become a haven for those looking for casual games to play. ...

A recent University of Manitoba study has shown that a quarter of the people taking medications designed for depression are doing so without being diagnosed for it. Psychologists have a very specific set of conditions that constitute a diagnosis of major depression. But what the research has shown is that anti-depressants are being prescribed without the patient fitting the pure definition. ...

There is little argument that genes play a part in the disposition towards depression and how we deal with stress. Often if one family member suffers from the disease, others in the family are more likely to do so as well. But little has been known on what gene that is and how it creates this scenario. ...

Menopausal women experiencing hot flashes may find some comfort from an odd source. The anti-depressant drug Lexapro (ecitalopam) has been shown in a new study to significantly reduce the frequency and the severity of the flashes. Women were given the drug for eight weeks and in that time, had a 44% less flashes per day and they were milder than the normal ones. This decrease appeared almost immediately or within a week of first taking the medication. While Lexapro has not been indicated by the FDA for the treatment of hot flashes, some doctors prescribe them anyway. Doctors also discovered that the drug does not make a lasting effect in the body, thus when ending the doses, women found that their symptoms returned with no reduction at all, just as it had been before they started taking it. ...

A study released today in Australia tracked 5600+ teens from 12 to 14 years of age to find out whether or not optimism had to do with risk of depression. The method by which they determined their findings was to ask questions of the students about their disposition and whether or not they were showing any signs of depression. Then they were revisited a year later to see if they were now reporting symptoms. What they found out was that the ones deemed positive thinkers were less likely, by half, to have symptoms of depression. ...

The VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam has released a study which analyzes the use of bright light therapy for treatment of major depression versus anti-depressants in seniors, one of the largest populations dealing with depression. The hypothesis for this is that older people may have more adverse reactions to prescription medication and so a non-pharmaceutical solution to help treat their depression would be welcome. The therapy is already being used to treat the depressive effects of seasonal affective disorder, where a person is depressed due to the inability to get enough natural light, like, for instance, in Alaska where the days are very short or non-existent. ...