Exploring the Growing Mental Health Challenges in Children
Mental health has been cast into the limelight over recent years as something everyone needs to spend more time prioritizing. Your mental health can dictate how you interact with your world, how your relationships thrive or fail, and the course of your physical health.
When you think of mental health and the challenges that it can pose, most people don't typically associate poor mental health with the child population.
Just as adult mental health is becoming a crisis situation, children and adolescents are experiencing something similar. Here’s a look at the growing mental health challenges among children.
The Prevalence of Mental Health Disorders
First, it’s worth looking at some statistics. Roughly 20% of children between the ages of three and seventeen in the United States have been diagnosed with some variation of a mental health and/or developmental disorder. By age fourteen, 50% of mental health problems that will develop will already be established. Unfortunately, half of those will go undiagnosed by a professional.
Contributing Factors
Covid Pandemic: During the pandemic shutdown and isolation practices that ensued, many mental health issues worsened. This could be due to increased stress and anxiety, a complete change in routine, and behavioral differences in others around.
Academic Pressure: With each year that passes, more pressure is placed on children to excel. If you don't get good grades, you won’t get into college. If you don’t go to college, you won’t find success. Common themes that are pushed onto children, when in reality, there are many ways to find success if academics aren’t their thing.
Social Media: Social media use has become a commonplace from the time children are very young. They’re exposed to more content than many adults were at that age. Plus, the feed is constant and instant. The brain isn’t made to take that kind of information 24/7.
Family Dynamics: If a parent is dealing with their own mental health issue, that places their child at a higher risk of developing something, especially being exposed to symptoms. When there is family conflict, that can also be a contributing factor.
Common Mental Health Challenges in Children
Children often struggle with similar versions of the issues adults do. Common mental health concerns for children include:
Anxiety
Depression
Eating disorders
Disruptive behavioral issues or aggression
PTSD
The Impact of Mental Health Challenges
Children are already dealing with a lot during these young years. After all, they’re learning how to process the world all while still in the heart of development stages. When you throw a mental health challenge on top of it, it makes it that much harder to function in a normal manner.
Often, children who aren’t being treated end up experiencing academic struggles, which can affect their grades and also their attitudes towards school itself. They may experience social struggles, like having a hard time relating to others or making new friends. Feeling like the outsider or different can lead to isolation and feelings of loneliness.
There’s also the possibility that whatever they’re dealing with as a child can transform into something larger as they get older.
How to Help
With mental health for children, early intervention is key. As a parent or guardian, it is important to understand the signs and symptoms of common mental health challenges. Knowing what they are and what they look like could be the difference in noticing any red flags early on.
Teaching children healthy coping strategies, whether for stress or another condition, will lead to more resiliency.
Finally, there is always the therapy route. Sometimes, a little intervention from an outside, professional source can help establish healthy options and uncover any root causes that are fueling declining mental health.
If your child is struggling with their mental health or you have noticed concerning behavior, reach out to us to know more about family therapy and schedule a session.