The climate crisis is another plausible factor, as are overburdened teachers and low-paid ones, the social media, and the crumbling mental health system.
There is another factor, less obvious, that could be contributing to this mental health crisis in youth: the paradoxical effect of increased mental health awareness.
Determining the problem
The young are now more aware of mental illness than ever before, thanks to the explicit efforts made in recent decades to increase awareness of mental disorders and mental health, including via social media.
Recent Research questions whether increased awareness of mental health issues is as beneficial as it first appears. Greater understanding may lead to “more accurate reporting” of previously unrecognized symptoms, but it can also cause some individuals to “interpret and report milder types of distress as mental disorders.”
Read more: Road to nowhere: New Zealanders struggle to get the help they need, two years on from a funding boost for mental health services.
People may then seek professional help, as they have been advised to do, but find such help is often unavailable. This, in turn, can lead to a very real increase in distress. And it may discourage more traditional and less clinical forms of coping, such as talking with friends and family or making positive lifestyle changes.
It’s also possible that greater acceptance and awareness of mental health issues may lead to people seeing those problems as an inherent part of themselves – simply as part of their brain chemistry.
This view can lead to a loss of agency in dealing with psychological challenges and a feeling of hopelessness.
Mental health and identity
It’s not surprising. Concept crawl is a term used to describe the gradual expansion of harmful concepts, such as bullying and mental disorders.
Take a look at how the terms “trauma” or “bullying” are used more often but have a less defined meaning in public discourse. This is the public’s perception of mental disorders, including the belief that mental illness is part of a person’s identity.
Read more: The impact of childhood and teenage anxiety disorders on later life – new research.
None of this suggests we should stop talking about such an important topic. Rather, we need to think very critically about how we talk about mental health and mental disorders – shifting from thinking in terms of mental health awareness to mental health literacy.
It is important to discuss what counts as a problem with mental health and what doesn’t. Some people experience anxiety levels that are clearly problematic. However, anxiety is also a healthy and normal human emotion. What is the exact line we should draw?
Read more: Is ‘climate anxiety’ a clinical diagnosis? Should it be?
Personal agency and hope
In order to answer this question, we must first understand what “mental disorder” means.
My new book, Embodied Embedded and Enactive Psychopathology: Reimagining Mental Disorders, explores how we can best understand mental illnesses.
This book offers a fresh approach to tackling this important but complex topic. The book acknowledges that brain, body, and environmental factors can influence mental disorders. It also maintains a feeling of agency and optimism – that mental health issues are things we can control.
It is not a question that a philosophical or academic argument can answer. This question has real implications for the health care system, how we should design our health policies, and how people understand mental health issues.
