Depression isn't inevitable as we age, but the problems we may have to face as we get older, such as divorce, bereavement and ill health, can predispose to it.
At certain stages of our development we may become more vulnerable to external changes and we will show this internal strain by being depressed.
It is lowering to find we can not do the things we used to, nor do we have the status of holding down a job.
As we go through middle age we may start to feel that we are lagging behind, we are slower than we once were.
The social causes of depression are the most important factors for elderly depression, which are always associated with separation and loss.

• Being poor does not necessarily lead to depression, but if poverty means a loss of status, it may.
  
• Bad weather does not necessarily lead to depression, but if bad weather means that you have to abandon a treat, then it can.
  
• Belonging to a minority group does not cause depression, but if by being so you are cut off from others or persecuted then it would not be surprising if you did get depressed.
  

Most people believe that there is one social factor - ISOLATION - that seems to be linked very closely with a tendency to depression.
As we get older, a wide range of social and psychological stresses may contribute to depression.
Bereavement would be the most dramatic for all of us, but other causes of isolation, such as our children getting married or their moving to another part of the country, or our re-housing away from a familiar neighbourhood, are examples that can cause disquiet.