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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

#131

Post by uoaei »

alexpetralia wrote: post #57
caesil wrote: post #18

I wonder if this doesn't have a lot to do with cars. In surrendering utterly to the preeminence of streets, we have essentially taken our open, free world and overlain it with an immense grid of electric fences -- thick lines all over the map that, if children wander across them, might easily lead to their deaths. So "hold hands everywhere" and "don't let your children run free outside" become the norms. The only saf…

Routinely in New York City at least, you can kill someone using a motor vehicle almost with complete impunity. The driver who led to Sammy's Law (which still hasn't passed) only received a 180 day license suspension a year and a half after the accident, even though he sped past a stopped vehicle on the righthand side (the vehicle had stopped for the child). Death by car is often considered acceptable. There is really…

Which is absolutely wild to me. It is a great responsibility to wield a multi-ton machine in the proximity of other people. Driver's licenses are handed out quite freely and it seems the reason has less to do with competence than a complete failure of the economy as we know it if people couldn't bring themselves between the places that earn them money and the places they spend them, especially considering how far apart they are from each other in cities built after cars were brought into public awareness.

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

#132

Post by kelseyfrog »

jeremyjh wrote: post #120
hattmall wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blaming other parents is great and probably correct, but putting blame on things outside of your control is a cop out. Why don't you move to an area that's not like that, or you go an play with your kid at the park until other kids show up. or build an app that makes the makes scheduling the play time very seamless.

Yeah dude why don't you take your 14 year-old to the park to play with their mom or just launch a startup to solve this problem.

It's actually a great opportunity to teach your kid to code so they can learn to solve their own problems by learning to launch their own startups.

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

#133

Post by nonethewiser »

rossdavidh wrote: post #125
nonethewiser wrote: post #64

> Moreover, the 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System survey revealed that during the previous year 18.8% of US high school students seriously considered attempting suicide, 15.7% made a suicide plan, 8.9% attempted suicide one or more times, and 2.5% made a suicide attempt requiring medical treatment. Wait a minute, what? Nearly 1 in 10 attempted suicide? So in a middle school of say 400 kids a kid would know…

2.5% of 400, or 10, made a suicide attempt requiring medical treatment. That doesn't mean the rest aren't in trouble and in need of help, but it's likely that in a previous decade we could have missed them. Still, 10 out of 400 needing medical treatment for a suicide attempt, is awful, and seems much higher than when I was in high school.

8.9% attempted suicide. Thats what im referring to as nearly 10%

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

#134

Post by clsec »

Seeing lots of comments about over scheduling children's free time.

I took music lessons, did Cub Scouts Weeblos & Boy Scouts, played little league, played Pop Warner & high school football and ran track. All after school activities.

As for freedom.. I took SF MUNI, BART, Ferries and Golden Gate Transit starting at 7 year old. Any free time I had was spent playing with friends. And I had to be home by the time the street lights came on.

So it is possible to have a lot of after school activities and plenty of time to play with friends and explore the world.

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

#135

Post by uoaei »

throwaway-243 wrote: post #128
alexpetralia wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Routinely in New York City at least, you can kill someone using a motor vehicle almost with complete impunity. The driver who led to Sammy's Law (which still hasn't passed) only received a 180 day license suspension a year and a half after the accident, even though he sped past a stopped vehicle on the righthand side (the vehicle had stopped for the child). Death by car is often considered acceptable. There is really…

7,485 pedestrians were killed by cars in the whole of the US in 2021. this is a great example of where whataboutism is not a logical fallacy. i mean what is your solution? ban all driving? sure, but give me a proper public transport network that can supply the suburbs and rural areas. fix urban cost of living while you're at it.

2021 is obviously an outlier in terms of driving and walking. Can't quite tell what point you're making but your example is not representative.

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

#136

Post by alex_lav »

atonse wrote: post #2

We have really made it a point to have our kid play freely as much as possible and minimize scheduled activities (piano lessons etc.) the problem is that most of his friends are in a million classes so even if he’s free, they often aren’t. That’s been the big challenge. So then there are these magical days where they all don’t have any activities and those invariably happen to be the days ALL kids look forward to. Cu…

My sister and I have separate mothers. My mother, who I lived with, was pretty absent throughout my childhood. I never really had any monitoring on how I spent my time, for better or worse, but that reality allowed me to kind of chase interests (or ignore interests) and cultivate a lot of passion and curiosity. My sister's mother was the exact opposite. She prioritized "getting to be a mom" over my sister's time and enjoyment, so she became a Scout Leader, Soccer Coach, Ballet Coordinator, Cheer Coach etc. and had my sister join all of those activities. Every day was school from 7-whenever, straight to dance, straight to homework, straight to bed. I don't think my sister ever had more than an hour or two free for her entire childhood. The outcome is kind of wild. She's an anxiety mess, overly controlling, but also unable to really think for herself or prioritize her interests (maybe because she doesn't have a ton?), and usually just takes the path of least resistance or that she's been told to take. I feel sad for her, but I obviously was powerless to stop it.

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

#137

Post by nyanpasu64 »

OO000oo wrote: post #99
pomian wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brilliant comment. We had a principal in our little community school who had exactly that attitude. He encouraged 'playing", and was often criticized for his efforts, by parents who didn't understand. Overall, however, the kids from that school were all eager learners, curious as to the world around them, socially very well integrated, and easily adapted to the rigors in high school and later. Play, is under valued.

The parents have every reason for concern, not because there's something wrong with the principal but because there's something wrong with the society their children are entering. The parents realize that their children will be screwed if they don't get into a good college, and the poorer parents need scholarships too! The principal's philosophical musings won't pay the bills.

My parents drove me to burnout, dropping out of college, and becoming an anxious traumatized wreck, by only providing support in response to achievements, and destroying my self-worth whenever I strayed from their chosen path of maximizing academic accomplishments to get into the most prestigious and stressful college possible. I don't plan to have kids, because I'm not doing well enough to provide an environment of psychological safety where they learn that they have worth as individuals and not just for their achievements, and I cannot give them a world where they will be safe from homelessness and starvation even if they do not find a high-paying college degree.

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

#138

Post by taeric »

C-x_C-f wrote: post #95
shard wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this seems to be purely a thing in the english speaking cultures This is a major thing in many East Asian cultures as well, China/Taiwan/Japan/Korea. Korea had to pass a law saying that private academies have to close at 10pm, so that kids aren't studying past midnight, but some academies still stay open secretly as the parents are demanding the extra hours. It's a vicious circle: kids compete for the few spots in…

I'm not familiar with this custom, but wouldn't kids with more balanced extracurricular lives have an advantage over those who fill their day to the brim? Surely after some point you hit diminishing returns, and after that it becomes downright damaging (in terms of mental health etc). So I'd expect the cycle to balance itself after a while, with parents eventually recognizing the importance of downtime. What gives? (…

Depends. If you think it is just diminishing returns, than you always get more the more you put in. Just not as much. You have to drop to negative returns for that to go away.

And indeed, in that framing, it is going to be tough to make it so that those who can afford to spend their time shouldn't do so.

So, are there policies where we could make it so that folks can put a legit value in the things they are neglecting for this extra spend in time? I can certainly hope so.

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

#139

Post by Tade0 »

pj_mukh wrote: post #46
fallingknife wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It's paranoia. Cars have been around for a long time.

Is it paranoia? If it wasn’t for guns, cars would be the number killer of kids under 16. Note: This includes kids IN cars being ferried around from activity to activity. Granted the numbers are lower now than before but that’s because of various safety and traffic calming efforts. Seems like we should push harder on that front, so parents can feel safe encouraging their kids to just pop over to their friends place on…

According to this poll:

https://reason.com/2014/08/19/august-2014-reason-rupe-nation...

Americans are split regarding whether there should be a law requiring 12-year-olds be supervised when playing in a park - no cars there.

As an European, to me this is absurd. At twelve I had a bus card and the privilege to go wherever, as long as I respected curfew.

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

#140

Post by kelseyfrog »

fnimick wrote: post #6
atonse wrote: post #2

We have really made it a point to have our kid play freely as much as possible and minimize scheduled activities (piano lessons etc.) the problem is that most of his friends are in a million classes so even if he’s free, they often aren’t. That’s been the big challenge. So then there are these magical days where they all don’t have any activities and those invariably happen to be the days ALL kids look forward to. Cu…

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)

When does little Johnny learn intrapersonal skills, conflict resolution skills, active listening skills, how to build and maintain friendship skills, or self-determination skills?
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