For years now, policymakers have sought an explanation for the mental health crisis among young people.
The social psychologist Jonathan Haidt points to smartphones, and the algorithms that draw kids away from healthy play and into dangerous, addictive thought loops.
The real problem is a grim social landscape of school shootings, poverty and global warming.
A group of researchers in Britain now propose another, at least partial, explanation: We talk about mental disorders so much.
This hypothesis is called “prevalence inflation.” It holds that our society has become so saturated with discussion of mental health that young people may interpret mild, transient suffering as symptoms of a medical disorder.
Persons:
Jonathan Haidt
Locations:
Britain