Today’s parents of youngsters and early teens have been described as “The Anxious Generation,” for serious reasons. Even parents of kids in early grades at school are concerned about what’s ahead. Their fears have entered widespread discussion, with the arrival of one book which recently reached the top of the New York Times’ literary chart.
It’s titled, The Anxious Generation or “How the great rewiring of childhood is causing an epidemic of mental illness.” Written by Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist who previously co-authored The Coddling of the American Mind, the new book sounds a chorus of serious concern about new and alarming behaviours currently affecting children as young as preteens. It especially applies to children who’ve developed eating disorders and body-image changes regarding their personal choices on calorie intake.
In a world of constant social media chatter, selfies and videos, counting calories has become a big issue among young teenagers. As one social worker puts it, “social media is so dangerous. Experts in this field are still just scratching the surface of the harm being done.
“The kids are so sophisticated about sex and alcohol, yet they still have teenage brains. It’s not just girls worrying over ‘bulking up’ their image. Boys are appearing equally self-conscious.
” The current concern affects all body types. Some children purposefully manage their food intake or its rejection, even from age 10. No surprise, now that Haidt’s book recently topped the New York Times’ list.
For those parents who’ve not fully recognized serious dangers from smartphone attachment affecting youngsters’ mental health, one mother, along with her supportive husband, countered with “healthy” controls. No smartphones allowed at a meal, nor after bedtime. This mother, who’s also in the social work field, has the phones put away in her bedroom, so no late-night conversations or photos can be exchanged on social media.
Equally important, she and her husband are a team regarding rules with younger teens. She speaks of a “developmental track,” such as the age at which younger kids and teens access pornography. “Some are as young as age nine.
That level is getting younger and younger.” She describes some of what kids search out — diet information, so-called ‘healthy’ dieting, plus influencers who look great on TikTok. “I’m not sure that there’s enough conversation between parents and children,” says this mother.
“We need to help the children understand what’s really happening in their brains; dopamine gets produced and affects the brain with the same kind of stimulation as happens with heroin.” Meanwhile, Jonathan Haidt’s book has been reviewed by Tracy Dennis-Tiwary, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, and director of the Emotion Regulation Lab at Hunter College. She described Haidt’s tone as an “erudite, engaging, combative and crusading new book.
” Her review considers Haidt’s references closely: “Mars is a stand-in for the noxious world of social media.” She suggests, “We should of course say no to this other alien universe.” She tells her readers that “we hem and haw about the risks, failing to keep our kids safely grounded in nondigital reality.
The result can no longer be ignored: deformities of the brain and heart — anxiety, depression, suicidality — are plaguing our youth.” Describing author Haidt as “a man on a mission,” whose first step is to convince his readers, i.e.
that youth are experiencing a “tidal wave of suffering.” Dennis-Tiwary says Haidt depicts increases in mental illness and distress having begun around 2012. Young adolescent girls are hit hardest, but boys are also in pain, as are older teens.
As for the actual culprit affecting our children? She says it’s what Haidt has termed “phone-based childhood.” The reviewer sums up her personal impression: From the late 2000s to the early 2010s, smartphones became ubiquitous. She adds that a second phenomenon coincided with the rise of the machines and the decline of play-based childhood.
She believes, “We’ve overprotected our kids in the real world while under-protecting them in the virtual one, leaving them too much to their own devices.” But, according to Haidt’s view, as the reviewer describes it, it’s this one-two punch of smartphones plus overprotective parenting, which led to the great rewiring of childhood and the associated harms driving mental illness, through social deprivation, sleep deprivation, attention fragmentation and addiction. She sums up, regarding this fascinating new book, that parents have always had an important job to do.
And every social time frame has had to learn to make the best of it — for the kids’ sakes..
