Joanna Moncrieff on serotonin and SSRIs

The serotonin theory of depression

In this interview, Joanna Moncrieff talks about the theory that depression is caused by low serotonin, a chemical imbalance that antidepressants were said to correct.

She is a professor at University College London, a consultant psychiatrist and a co-founder of the Critical Psychiatry Network. In 2022 she led a review of the serotonin theory of depression. She says it found no consistent evidence that low serotonin causes depression. Her book is called Chemically Imbalanced.

What the interview covers

• How the chemical imbalance theory began, and how, in her account, it became a marketing tool for drug companies.
• Her view that psychiatry promoted an idea it knew was weak.
• What antidepressants do to the brain, and why, she says, that is still not fully understood.
• Emotional blunting, physical dependence and long-term withdrawal.
• Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction (PSSD), and why she thinks it gets so little recognition.
• Why, in her view, psychiatry stays defensive.
• What she would change: treating emotional suffering as less of a medical problem, and building an honest system of care.

Thank you to Joanna Moncrieff for this interview. It was recorded by Moral Medicine, who have filmed more than ninety of these conversations.

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