Psychologists and other mental professionals have expressed concern over what they see as a mental health crisis in teens and young adults. Some psychologists recommend regular anxiety screenings for youth ages 8 to 18, and regular depression screenings for ages 12 to 18. Recent clinical studies with teens have focused on anxiety, bipolar disorder, depression, eating disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, addiction, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and suicide. Mental health workers note pandemic social isolation and the academic disruption children and teens faced: caregivers died or lost their job from Covid, and kids were victims of physical or emotional abuse at home; there are ongoing social media tensions, school violence, and climate worries, plus the usual adolescent hormonal chaos. Is it all too much for many youngsters?
I was a teenager from 1957 (age 13) to 1964 (age 20). As I recall, I had two main worries: keeping up with schoolwork, and girls. The former was manageable as long as I was willing to put in the time and effort; the latter was a losing battle. Girls remained a constant source of frustration, bewilderment, and rejection. In college my stressors were classes, grades, and girls, who remained a source of frustration, bewilderment, and rejection. I was in college when the Cuban missile crisis happened, but no one really believed the world was going to end. The calculus test was still on tap for tomorrow. Kennedy was assassinated but no one feared for the Republic; Johnson was sworn in within hours and life went on. There were rumblings in Southern cities and I believed in Dr. King’s message, but at the end of the day, I was White. No problem. There were no smart phones, no internet, no school shootings, no attacks on the Capitol.
I have no doubt that the stressors for teens today are more intense than in my day. Being bullied on the playground is one thing; bullied on social media is tougher on the victim. Going to class to take a test is one thing, but wondering if someone will show up with an assault rifle is quite another; taking No-Doz to help with studying all night is one thing, but scoring MDMA, ecstasy, cloud nine, or shrooms goes to another level. But there’s another difference between yesterday and today, a difference that’s overlooked but that I think makes today more stressful: Teens today live in a “psychologized” society; I did not.
What’s a psychologized society? It’s a society where we are sensitized to—alert to, vigilant about— psychological disorders; it’s a society where people believe every unexpected event, every challenge to one’s plans, every conflict, every “OMG” intrusion into one’s world is going to be psychologically debilitating; it’s a society where words like, “You need counseling,” “You’re probably bipolar,” and, “You have anxiety issues from PTSD,” are commonplace; it’s a society where we convince teens that because they have “mental issues,” that they are abnormal and afflicted with a psychological disorder.
More than once, I recall my parents saying, “You’re getting a little big for your britches, young man. It’s time for you to show some respect for your elders.” I never heard them say, “You have oppositional defiant disorder; we’ll have you checked by a counselor.” Today, however, when teens hear the “counselor” word—and they hear it often—they immediately think, “Counselor? OMG, I’m mentally ill!” And downward they spiral from there. That’s what happens to teens who live in a psychologized society in 2024. I saw a recent newspaper article about the importance of choosing a college major as soon as possible because, “Imagine the emotional stress of having to find a new major and career path one or two years shy of getting your college degree.” I taught college for 41 years (1970-2011) and I believe that the statement’s overemphasis on “emotional stress” is misguided. I advised scores of students who wanted to change their major and their career path. In 1961 I had a college friend who had a first-year gpa of 1.7. [You need a cumulative 2.0 to graduate.] He decided to change his major. His second-year gpa was 2.3 and things turned around by his junior year. He was behind but he caught up with a couple of summer courses. But you know what? Never did anyone—no friend, no parent, no teacher, no advisor—say to him, “You’re going to be under a lot of emotional stress with this change of major and you should go to the Counseling Center for help in dealing with the anxiety.” That just wasn’t our culture in the 1960s.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th edition, published in 2013) contains nearly 300 disorders. The first edition of this manual (published in 1952) contained 102 disorders. There can be little doubt that the manner of classifying mental disorders has changed and been significantly refined in the last 70 years. The problem is, these refinements have led to a greater number of “disorders,” and terms like bipolar, PTSD, anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive, eating disorders, and addiction have become commonplace. The result is that impressionable teens integrate disorders into their developing self-concept, and fall victim to believing that they are abnormal. This self-preoccupation and self-sabotaging process is helped along by indulgent, guilt-ridden parents, and their kids develop a sense of entitlement—“treat me gently; I’m bipolar”—that they wear for all to see. We are seeing in real time the consequences of this psychologizing process in our society as support services struggle to keep up with increasing numbers of youngsters who believe they are “mentally ill.” Of course, the internet, school violence, and climate worries are partly to blame. But so is the psychologized society we have created. Maybe, just maybe, instead of playing the mental disorder card every time a young person strays, adults should convey a message like this to them: “The world is a tough place and has some harsh standards. But, that’s reality, and I know that you can meet those standards; I have faith in your ability to do that, and I’m here to help out when you need it.”
Psychology and Stress 