Time passes differently for the depressed

Scientific American - Depression Makes Time Estimates More Accurate

In a small study, students who were mildly depressed and ones that were not were asked to judge the length of a sound (tone) that lasted between a few seconds to just over a minute. They were then asked to reproduce the tone length. In general, the non-depressed students (who are comparatively happier) would overestimate (by 16%) the length of time the tone lasted, and then, when asked to reproduce it, produced a time that was 13% shorter. The depressed students underestimated the tone length by only 3% and then when they had to reproduce the tone, over-did it by only 8%. Depressed subjects were more accurate with their judgments of time passing (if anything, perceiving it to pass more quickly), while healthier ones considered time to pass more slowly. [The trouble with slow/fast descriptors with the perception of time is that it is easy to get confused. I think it is perhaps more accurate to say that healthy people perceive time as more "full" than depressed ones, who perceive it more accurately, but perhaps as more "thin".] The attitude of "depressive realism" (more accurate perceptions when depressed) may be seen not just to apply to self-perception but also other phenomena like time. Finally, researchers speculated that being more "mindful" of the present and not focusing on the passing of time may be a partial treatment for depression.