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Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

jonathanhaidt.substack.com

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Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#351

Post by uoaei »

SoftTalker wrote: post #145
uoaei wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Witnessed this kind of thing today. Doting father of three boys on vacation. They're all ditzing around on busy sidewalks and the father barks "Control yourselves!" It occurred to me at that moment that this kind of hovering and scolding teaches children to externalize the responsibility of understanding their environment and their place within it . They will literally never learn the lessons this father wants to imp…

Eh don't beat yourself up. I grew up with a lot of unstructured play time and I still don't feel like I have any real passions or a very satisfying career. I think that's pretty normal and a lot of what people talk about with regards to passions and interests is just bullshit or making conversation. A father or mother admonishing their kids to behave in public is not really anything new either.

The instance was exemplary of a broader philosophy of thinking for children, rather than providing opportunities for them to learn to think for themselves. Such is the nature of parables.

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#352

Post by bowsamic »

majormajor wrote: post #276
bowsamic wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s like pointing out how money corrupts or makes you not appreciate wealth truly. That may be true in some cases, but it’s still much better to be rich than poor

I think you are making a big and unjustified leap from "minimizing scheduled extracurriculars" in the post you're responding to to "won't be prepared at all." And that's an especially dangerous assumption if you buy the original article here's claim that not doing that is a big problem for mental health.

I don’t see how I’m making that leap

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#353

Post by watwut »

ryandrake wrote: post #267
SomewhatLikely wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My young kids would be totally unaware if they were bumping into others, or causing them to stop abruptly, or otherwise interfering with others. Of course if those strangers yelled at them or provided some less harsh form of feedback it might register with them, but I find most people don't say anything so it's on me to let my kids know the effects they're behavior is having.

> I find most people don't say anything so it's on me to let my kids know the effects they're behavior is having. People are terrified of saying anything because of the likely reaction of the kids' parents. The "it takes a village" mindset is gone. If someone's kid runs into you and you so much as say "excuse me" to them, you risk the parents getting in your face, holding up their cellphone camera, yelling "You don't…

Genuinely, I am not terrified. I just do not care all that much about other people's kids. In interactions I had or seen with parents or kids, literally never did any parent yelled at me or anyone else for saying "excuse me" or "that is mine".

But fundamentally, keeping control Iverson a kid is on parent and I don't think about bumping kids enough to form a sentence. I just expect parents to tell them cause it is their job and in this story, the parent in fact intervened.

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#355

Post by mantas »

bowsamic wrote: post #257
jjk166 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When was the last time a job interviewer asked what extracurriculars you did when you were 14? There is an extremely small sliver of society where that one additional extracurricular makes the difference between getting into an excellent school vs a merely great school. For everyone else, the long term value is quite dubious.

As much as you might want it to be, your life right now is not a blank human plus qualifications. Who you are as a person is shaped by your life before this point. A person who has invested in those extra curricular skills will simply be more skilled now, from precise ways (the specific skills learnt) to more general ways (the required concentration and perseverance etc)

I’d argue those kids don’t learn much concentration and so on. Being forced by your parents to follow schedule they made is quite a mundane skill. Works great to become a mindless office worker though. Look down, carry out tasks you’re told to do… and don’t complain. But is it really a life to look forward to?

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#356

Post by gettodachoppa »

atonse wrote: post #17
fnimick wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but are you maximizing his college admissions chances via skills in carefully selected activities in order to stand out? (mostly joking, but this is how a lot of people approach scheduling these days)

haha I have been maximizing the annoyance level of my parents and others by telling my kids these things: - don’t focus on GPA, focus on actually gaining knowledge and understanding how the world works. good grades are a measure of how you understand things. they should never be the goal. I was a C student and I am more curious about things than many of my peers with fancy degrees. - forge your own path, there is alw…

>We’ve told them we will not pay for their college. so they will have to make choices about getting the best bang for your buck

I've read this before from Americans, and I don't get it. In my culture if parents can pay for their kids' education, they do it. There's a time and a place to teach them financial responsability, I feel distracting them with financial concerns during their most challenging years of schooling is not it.

When I went to college (paid for by my parents), I had friends who had to work on the side to pay for rent and groceries. They barely hung by, very few had great grades since they had to split their time between work and study. One of my close friends ended up dropping out because he was burned out.

Of course this doesn't mean you should pay 50k for a degree in feminist dance therapy, you make sure you only pay for something with ROI (That's another thing I don't understand about Americans. In a country with tuition so high, how can so many pursue degrees with such awful job prospects?)

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#357

Post by mantas »

lossolo wrote: post #270
mantas wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disadvantaged in what sense? It’s likely those kids won’t even go for the same grind as „managed“ kids.

Kids that have more math lessons, in most cases, will be better at math than the ones that don't. There are limited amount of jobs, students per class in college etc so they compete with each other. If you are living in the same system as most people in this thread, which is capitalism, then to live a somewhat problem-free life with financial security, you need to be either very lucky or participate in the rat race.

I wouldn’t say rat race is problem-free life. All sorts of mental and physical health issues plague the modern rat race society.

The only realistic way to win is not to play.

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#358

Post by mantas »

taeric wrote: post #144
mantas wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately it’s getting worse here. In my youth few kids had scheduled activities. 20 years later, many kids are on a rather tight schedule.

Not really discounting your experiencs, but 20 years ago plenty of folks had scheduled activities. Music lessons didn't get invented in the past two decades. Nor did school/college prep. Indeed, the numbers typically show that those that did this, had a better chance of success at whatever they were scheduled to do. (This fits expectations, too. People succeed at that that they are prepared to do...) Would love to se…

I myself went to music lessons for a bit and did take some extra classes to catch up. But it was an hour or two a week here and there. I still had 4 out of 5 afternoons to myself any given year. And no stuff on weekends. It’s incomparable to kids schedules today.

To be fair, my schedule got quite busy in final years. But it was because I started building websites for €€€. But I doubt it’s comparable to parents-scheduled extracurricular activities. And I learned programming in my free unstructured time by myself.

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#359

Post by bowsamic »

mantas wrote: post #355
bowsamic wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as you might want it to be, your life right now is not a blank human plus qualifications. Who you are as a person is shaped by your life before this point. A person who has invested in those extra curricular skills will simply be more skilled now, from precise ways (the specific skills learnt) to more general ways (the required concentration and perseverance etc)

I’d argue those kids don’t learn much concentration and so on. Being forced by your parents to follow schedule they made is quite a mundane skill. Works great to become a mindless office worker though. Look down, carry out tasks you’re told to do… and don’t complain. But is it really a life to look forward to?

It takes concentration and effort to follow schedule

They should aim to become a so-called “mindless office worker” as it offers a very high quality of life, so yes that is a life worth looking forward to. It’s a life our ancestors would sell their daughters for

Re: Play deprivation is a major cause of the teen mental health crisis

#360

Post by bowsamic »

mantas wrote: post #357
lossolo wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kids that have more math lessons, in most cases, will be better at math than the ones that don't. There are limited amount of jobs, students per class in college etc so they compete with each other. If you are living in the same system as most people in this thread, which is capitalism, then to live a somewhat problem-free life with financial security, you need to be either very lucky or participate in the rat race.

I wouldn’t say rat race is problem-free life. All sorts of mental and physical health issues plague the modern rat race society. The only realistic way to win is not to play.

You can not play if you want but you will be impoverished

This enlightened thinking is good for you ego but you do actually have a material body to feed, so you either play the game of life or you die

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