Anhedonia

   (1896 and later)

   Although loss of interest in pleasure had always been seen as one of the symptoms of depression, it was only in 1896 that Théodule- Armand Ribot (1839–1916), professor of experimental psychology at the University of Paris, coined in The Psychology of Sentiments (La Psychologie des Sentiments) the term "anhédonie," meaning "insensibility relating to pleasure alone" (p. 53). Yet Ribot’s coinage had little immediate impact.

   Anhedonia became launched into the German world of psychopathological thinking as Karl Jaspers in 1913 used the expression "the feeling of loss of feelings" ("das Gefühl, man habe keine Gefühle mehr"). "The patients complain that they are unable to experience pleasure or pain" (General Psychopathology [Allgemeine Psychopathologie], p. 67). In 1922, Boston psychiatrist Abraham Myerson (1881–1948) defined anhedonia in the American Journal of Psychiatry to mean the loss of interest in everything pleasurable plus "the disappearance of the energy feeling": "life itself lacks desire and satisfaction" (p. 91). Myerson’s broader definition became the standard in American psychiatric writing. (During the years, the belief established itself that in schizophrenia there is no feeling; this is sometimes called "anhedonia" as well.)