Unemployment is taking a significant toll on a person’s personal happiness in the United States. A new poll reveals that unemployed adults in the United States were more than twice as likely to have been treated for depression than those who are currently employed, the Medical Daily reported.

According to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, the depression rates doubled for U.S. adults who had been unemployed for a year or more compared to those who were unemployed for five weeks or less. The poll questioned the well-being of 356,599 Americans, of which 18,322 were unemployed for an entire year between Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2013.

People naturally lose faith and optimism the longer they are unemployed because of the lack of accomplishment and progress. Depression likely follows pessimism, especially for those who’ve been out of a job for months on end. Depression is clinically diagnosed as a mood disorder. The American Psychiatric Association defines depression as “a serious medical illness that negatively affects how you feel, the way you think and how you act.”

The most common symptoms are feelings of sadness or loss of interesting, changes in diet such as losses or gains in weight, insomnia or oversleeping, increased fatigue, restlessness, irritability, feelings of worthlessness or misplaced guilt, difficulty thinking or concentrating, and even thoughts of death or suicide.

Coupled with these symptoms, depression makes the job search even more difficult than it already was in the beginning. The longer a person has to endure such negative emotions, the harder it becomes to overcome and persevere, which is oftentimes why the unemployed become “stuck.”