The dominant biomedical model of health does not take secular perspectives into consideration (SITE BOOK). Lay people's perspectives go into detail about the common sense and personal experiences of ordinary people. A cultural perspective, such as the Hmong culture's perspective on health, is considered a secular perspective. Unlike the Hmong culture, where illness is seen as the imbalance between the soul and the body, the dominant biomedical model of health views health in terms of pathology and disease (BOOK SITE). Although Hmong culture considers spiritual and environmental factors, the dominant biomedical model of health looks at health only through a biological perspective and neglects the environment and psychological factors that influence health. Depression in the United States is a medical illness caused by a neurochemical or hormonal imbalance and certain thinking styles. Depression is the result of unfortunate experiences that the brain has difficulty processing (SITE 7). Unlike in Hmong culture, where Hmong diagnosed with depression report interaction between a spirit, people diagnosed with depression in Western culture report having symptoms such as feeling tired, unhappy, and suicidal (SITE