The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012 • Hacker News Board

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#201

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:34 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #69

amadeuspagel wrote: post #40

Social media is global, so any effects it has should be visible globally. > Teenage suicides rates have, on average, declined slightly over the past two decades or so. While in 1990 there were, on average across the OECD, 8.5 suicides per 100 000 teenagers (15-19), by 2015 this rate had fallen to 7.4. Much of this decline occurred during the 2000s. Between 1990 and 1999 the OECD average teenage suicide remained fairl…

> Social media is global, so any effects it has should be visible globally. That isn't true at all. There may be a hundred factors at play, which are all different in different cultures, regions, countries, etc. The cultural context of an individual can dramatically change how they react to situations, pressures, and mental illness.

Fascinating. It is a pity then that our culture is so terrible as to make teens have mental illness at rates that dwarf other nations (who have cultures that are far superior at keeping teens mentally healthy). It is a shame that we blame social media for this when clearly it is our culture that is the difference and the cause.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#202

Post by rabuse » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:36 PM UTC

chasd00 wrote: post #149

Teens are going to therapy a lot more and there are lots of mental illnesses that weren’t defined earlier. Depressed, anxious, and angsty teens isn’t new. All the diagnoses and innovative “billable events” are however.

Yet suicide numbers keep skyrocketing, so much much is that actually helping?

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#203

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:37 PM UTC

Right around when Obama was elected again and the Mayan calendar predicted.

But I am partial to his conclusion. For what it's worth, I am diagnosed with a half dozen mental illnesses, but if I'm being honest I just memorized the DSM-V criteria and appropriately played along and I have a bunch of prescriptions. I never use them, but it's nice to know I can get amphetamine and ketamine whenever I want.

America requires you to play sick to do certain things. So I can play sick. I wonder if the kids have found this loophole too. They're usually smarter than us adults and have less wisdom, so probably.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8JtnUpkP0s

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#204

Post by brookst » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:38 PM UTC

jahsome wrote: post #168

mouse_ wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guarantee most of these "high achieving high anxiety types" live with significantly less anxiety than customer service reps/bag handlers/food service workers.

Do you honestly see value in comparing scars? Does that matter in any meaningful way? The worst stress of someone's life is the worst stress of their life. It's unproductive and petty to bicker about who has it worse. If life is stressful for anyone, regardless of status, title, age, etc. there's a good chance it's undeserved. The takeaway is to treat people better, not dismiss their stressors as less significant.

The parent comment was asserting that STEM types are “high anxiety” and implicitly dismissing non-STEM people as somehow having less anxiety. I think it is fair and healthy to acknowledge that, as you say, everyone has “the worst stress of their life”, regardless of STEM-ness.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#205

Post by golemiprague » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:39 PM UTC

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Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#206

Post by rpmisms » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:39 PM UTC

sophacles wrote: post #97

6_6_6 wrote: post #76

good times (pax americana) create weak people (fat, depressed, entilted, egomaniacs, etc) we need a 'war' to prune the tree of life yet again human is not above the nature winter is comming

Are you seriously suggesting it's a good idea to kill off a bunch of folks? Let me guess, you are in the group that gets to survive, and you just want to provide a "solution" to all the people that you dislike. I have a better idea: lead by example. Why don't you demonstrate the effectiveness of removing a bad branch on yourself first?

Nobody needs to actually die, things just need to be hard to remind us what being human is about.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#207

Post by whstl » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:42 PM UTC

benrhodesuk wrote: post #53

righttoolforjob wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consuming is the worst. The Internet is a toxic cesspool, for the most part. Having an account and interacting with friends would be one of the few exceptions, and maybe learning some stuff now and then.

Yea. I agree there is a lot of bad things to consume. In general what he consumes tends to lean towards the toxic end of things. A lot of learning, science and educational content. And then gaming-related content (Minecraft, etc.). Obviously, some of the gaming content can get toxic. But he's always been pretty good about staying away from more toxic gaming content. And while he will watching gaming content on Youtub…

I think you're the first here in this topic that talked about Twitch and streamers.

I know a few streamers and we're aware of people that spend sometimes up to 5 hours a day on every single stream they do. Some of those donating hundreds of dollars a month to a single streamer. The stream chat is their hobby and the majority of their social interaction. The streamers are also burned out.

I'm all for people finding a community, and that's sort of what we do at HN. But that's a bit extreme for me.

IMO things are only going to get worse from here.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#208

Post by eikenberry » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:43 PM UTC

carabiner wrote: post #90

nluken wrote: post #79

While I don't doubt that social media can drive some of these mental health issues, I think most teenagers are simply stressed from the constant work that's necessary for the college admissions process. I'm 24, so I would have been a teenager in 2012, but I didn't have a smartphone until I was 16 or so. My high school experience consisted almost entirely of school, studying, and running (my primary extracurricular).…

40% of high school students don't go to college (of any type). Of those, only a tiny portion are focused on elite universities. Many are just going to Long Beach State, University of Redlands and other 4 year schools that you've never heard of. They have lax admissions. Among adult Americans, only a third have bachelors degrees. Certainly the high pressure scholastic environment of certain high schools is not common.

You forget the cost of "just" those state universities still requires many students to get scholarships to afford. So the pressure is not just about getting into a good university, for many it is being able to go at all.

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#209

Post by nabakin » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:43 PM UTC

nluken wrote: post #79

While I don't doubt that social media can drive some of these mental health issues, I think most teenagers are simply stressed from the constant work that's necessary for the college admissions process. I'm 24, so I would have been a teenager in 2012, but I didn't have a smartphone until I was 16 or so. My high school experience consisted almost entirely of school, studying, and running (my primary extracurricular).…

> I think most teenagers are simply stressed from the constant work that's necessary for the college admissions process.

If this was true, you'd expect there to be a similar trend between Major Depression and college admissions. The data doesn't seem to show that[1][2]

[1] https://educationdata.org/wp-content/uploads/74/Historical-C...

[2] http://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/a6...

Most teenagers don't stress over college admissions in my experience. The top like 30% academically successful teens probably do, but I believe this effect is seen across teenagers of all groups

Re: The teen mental illness epidemic began around 2012

#210

Post by andai » Wed, Feb 08, 2023, 7:43 PM UTC

gnramires wrote: post #118

vkk8 wrote: post #51

Anecdotally, I was (as probably many here were) ahead of the curve in digital devices usage when I started hanging out in IRC and various web forums as a teenager in early 2000s. At some point I noticed that just using computers induced some amount of anxiety compared to "old tech"; whenever there was some period of time when I used my computer less (like christmas, vacations, etc.) and joined back to the "world of t…

> Can you think of other activities that require this? Well, reading books (and other documents). I also am suspicious of screens (and specially spending too much time on them... I'm certainly guilty), but the existence of books is somewhat confusing in this regard. However, I really don't think the population as a whole was reading quite as many books/documents as we today use digital devices or social media. That c…

Growing up in the 2000s I remember there was much more excitement and optimism for the future. Now it seems to range from cynicism to dread to abject paranoia. Or perhaps my liberal use of cannabis in my younger years shifted me into a more paranoid timeline... alas!

Re: books being less stressful, I think e-ink is a great example. It feels more solid, more permanent, even though the text changes when you swipe the page. It seems to be a combination of the "paper" look making it seem less virtual (than the blinkenlights matrix), and the impossibility of scrolling on e-ink making it by necessity a more calming medium.

Real books are even better, of course, in both regards, but can't compete on price / delivery time.