Saw a post on Paul Graham's twitter about this, turns out white, liberal female teens were the most depressed, for whatever reason, that's a strange specific group to be extremely depressed imho.
[deleted]
The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
81–90 of 514 posts
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you expand on your thoughts here? This is not a group whose lives I generally expect to be getting worse (in day-to-day life, barring social media effects).
Huge expectations around women “having it all” clashing into economic uncertainty and the revocation of rights.
I'm not trying to be annoying, but I genuinely don't understand what you mean by huge expectations of "having it all" for women (at least insofar as it relates to any trend starting ~2012, when the large growth in depression and self-harm among teen girls seems to have started).
The only "revocation of rights" I can think of would be Dobbs - which also does not fit the trend (see my response to the other comment).
If (white liberal) teen girls are supposed to actually see their real lives getting worse, I still don't see any reason for this to have become a problem in the early 2010s.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#83Can't this just be the effect of teens being more aware of their own mental health issues and reporting them more?
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you expand on your thoughts here? This is not a group whose lives I generally expect to be getting worse (in day-to-day life, barring social media effects).
One key element (though not the only one) is Dobbs v. Jackson , subsequent legislation encouraged by it, and the highly visible effects that this has had on reproductive healthcare even where no actual elective abortion is involved . In terms of cultural expectations of progress and very visceral potential personal impact and perceived position in society, this is a radical reverse for that group (on the second point…
That doesn't fit the data though. Dobbs v Jackson was in 2022. The increase starts in around 2012. That's before Trump and the current wave of politicians who are behind Dobbs, etc. In 2012, Obama was President, the Paycheck Fairness Act was passed, Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, Pelosi had recently been the first woman to be speaker of the house, two women were added to the supreme court, etc.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#85I recall seeing commentary recently from mental health specialists that noted that young people are increasingly facing a sense of existential dread over climate change - that there's nothing they can do to stop it, and will feel the impact more heavily than previous generations. I wouldn't discount social media and related issues out of hand, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's a contributing factor. I understand…
There is a big divide between the young who think the world is over climate and the older who know better
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#86Seeing as how my daughter has gone through ten years of therapy due to depression I'll throw my hat in the ring and tell you what I think at least part of the problem is: Late stage, winner-takes-all & loser-gets-nothing, Capitalism. Those of us who are well-entrenched in our careers may not understand how vicious the world is for the entry-level and those aspiring to launch careers. The secondary schools preach and…
Add increasing concentration of wealth in less and less people, increasing job insecurity due to technological advances rendering many jobs completely useless (and transfers even more wealth to those that are already haves and removes it even more from have-nots), the instant access to compare yourself to millions of others around the world...
I seriously can't understand why some people scratch their heads around the youth's mental health crisis. I'd be baffled if they weren't depresesd.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
My experience is the same, back in the 1990s. There was a ton of depression and even suicides when I was growing up. I felt like 50% of teens at my large HS were suffering from some kind of mental issue. And then you had major events like Columbine. The US school system has always managed to produce a lot of very miserable people, and no one seemed to care or do anything about it. And now we have these studies all bl…
In the article, the author makes a point to include objective metrics like rate of hospitalizations, and the data is quite conclusive in showing an actual increase. So these issues definitely did not exist before, at the same scale.
Rate of hospitalization seems like the sort of thing that would be affected by if society frowns upon getting help or not.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#88I recall seeing commentary recently from mental health specialists that noted that young people are increasingly facing a sense of existential dread over climate change - that there's nothing they can do to stop it, and will feel the impact more heavily than previous generations. I wouldn't discount social media and related issues out of hand, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's a contributing factor. I understand…
now imagine spamming their phones with tik tok videos about the end of the world due to ____________. In your example, it's climate change. Maybe it's that, but it could also be that we can now mainline hours and hours of highly provocative content directly into a growing brain.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you expand on your thoughts here? This is not a group whose lives I generally expect to be getting worse (in day-to-day life, barring social media effects).
Social rank is zero-sum. Better positioning for previously unfavored group/races is the right thing but lowers relative social rank of those above.
I feel like this could be a reasonable explanation for the race piece, but I'm unsure how it connects to the female & liberal pieces. I'm not sure being a conservative male has gained a lot of social status in the past decade, though I suppose it's definitely possible.
Re: The teen mental illness epidemic is international – Part 1: The Anglosphere
#90I recall seeing commentary recently from mental health specialists that noted that young people are increasingly facing a sense of existential dread over climate change - that there's nothing they can do to stop it, and will feel the impact more heavily than previous generations. I wouldn't discount social media and related issues out of hand, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's a contributing factor. I understand…
Existential dread over climate change is a symptom, not a cause of mental health problems.
Why would this be? It is obvious the existentially complicated things create anxiety.