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Mental health is one of the most urgent issues before society today, especially among young people. The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that about 1 in 6 adolescents from 10 to 19 years of age experience a mental disorder. This is the most prevalent among boys and girls aged 10-14, with the average onset of a mental disorder at age 11. The disorders most frequently experienced are anxiety and mood disorders, with a dramatic increase over the last decade in the number of young people diagnosed. Our society as a whole might be better equipped to deal with these issues in the immediate present and in the long term if we understand the crisis in mental health among youth not just as an individual problem but as a pressing societal problem. The WHO puts a very human face on this crisis when it notes that “50% of all mental illnesses begin by age 14 and 75% by age 24.”

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The mental health catastrophe is severe. The National Institute of Mental Health indicates that in 2021, a little under 10% of adolescents aged 12-17 experienced a major depressive episode, with the median age of onset being 15.3. Importantly, this is a situation in which not only the individual is affected but the society as a whole, since untreated mental health conditions can lead to adverse outcomes in education and long-term economic prospects. Dr. Lisa Damour, a clinical psychologist and author, states that “one of the most jarring and sobering statistics that we have at the moment is that in a recent year, just under 10% of our young people were experiencing major depression.” Many studies are now being conducted to better understand the situation’s complexities and look for possible causes and conditions that may have led to it. One of the first and most prominent factors being discussed is social media.

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Several arguments can be made to understand the mental health predicament among young people today. One is that we have a crisis of expectations that our youth are simply not living up to, largely thanks to social media. Our young people today are inundated with images and content that are, at best, highly curated and edited versions of life. Young people describe the pressure to perform not just in school but in every aspect of their lives, thanks to a culture that seems to always be on, 24/7. Indeed, the most recent American Psychological Association’s Stress in America survey found that 45% of teens reported feeling stressed during the school year. On top of an unprecedented wave of performance-driven mental health issues come the very real issues stemming from family; young people certainly can’t choose the family they’re born into. Whether or not they’re resilient or have a healthy support system can make or break the chances of youth in this country having mental health parity.

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The economic difficulties facing families may also contribute to mental health problems among young people. The financial strain can lead to instability at home, which certainly affects a child’s emotional well-being. A report issued by the Annie E. Casey Foundation found that kids living in economically stressed families are much more likely to have mental health problems. Most of us would agree that the things happening in the economy are not helping families at all. But even before our current economic situation, youth mental health for the very young (age 6-12) and even for adolescents (age 13-19) has been declining.

Of course, some critics might say that kids today are just being over-diagnosed; that we’re labeling them with “pathologies” that used to just be normal teenage behavior. But what those critics fail to take into account is that we’re not just experiencing an uptick in diagnoses. We’re actually seeing a rise in the prevalence of these disorders.

For the average reader, the mental health crisis among youth is not just a statistic. It reflects the future of society. The well-being of young people is intrinsically linked to the health of communities and economies. If we fail to address this crisis, we risk creating a generation that is unfit to contribute to society in any meaningful way. Mental health problems can lead to a crisis-driven healthcare system, less basic overall productivity, and a flood of mental health issues that affect not just individuals but entire communities, which can lead to an unproductive and barely sustainable existence overall. The youth mental health crisis is here, and it is a crisis we have to deal with if we have any hope at all of redeeming our future. Society has to confront the false narratives it tells itself about youth mental health. We can’t keep acting like this is a simple issue of kids today being too weak to handle life. We have to confront the social, familial, and economic factors that are clearly involved.