A Unified Theory of Mental Illness: How Everything from Addiction to Depression Can Be Explained by the Concept of “Capture”

David Kessler–once the Com­mis­sion­er of the F.D.A., lat­er the Dean of Yale’s School of Med­i­cine, and even­tu­al­ly Dean and Vice-Chan­cel­lor at UCS­F’s pres­ti­gious Med­ical School–pub­lished a book called Cap­ture: Unrav­el­ing the Mys­tery of Men­tal Suf­fer­ing. A best­seller, the book makes the case that all men­tal illness–everything from addic­tion to depres­sion to artis­tic obsessions–can be explained by an under­ly­ing mech­a­nism. That mech­a­nism, the key to treat­ing men­tal ill­ness, is known as “Cap­ture.”

To get a brief intro­duc­tion to Kessler’s uni­fied the­o­ry of men­tal ill­ness, watch the ani­mat­ed primer above. It comes cour­tesy of The Atlantic. Get more back­ground on Kessler’s book by read­ing this review in The New York Times.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Stanford’s Robert Sapol­sky Demys­ti­fies Depres­sion, Which, Like Dia­betes, Is Root­ed in Biol­o­gy

Stephen Fry on Cop­ing with Depres­sion: It’s Rain­ing, But the Sun Will Come Out Again

Intro­duc­tion to Psy­chol­o­gy: A Free Course from Yale Uni­ver­si­ty

Free Online Psy­chol­o­gy & Neu­ro­science Cours­es