The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness
- Nichole Bomar
- 4 days ago
- 4 min read
by Jonathan Haidt
A Book Review
PLOT SUMMARY:
“There was little sign of an impending mental illness crisis among adolescents in the 2000s. Then, quite suddenly, in the early 2010s, things changed” (29).
In his four-part book, The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt explores the toll the internet, gaming, smart phones and social media has taken on youth beginning in the early 2010’s. Part one and two provide the history of the impact of technology use has had, providing many charts and graphs tracking the decline in the mental health of our youth worldwide. Haidt compares the “play-based” childhood to the “phone-based” childhood. A play-based childhood includes the following five ingredients that are necessary for healthy physical, social, and psychological development: A slow-growth childhood defined as the period of development that slows down during middle childhood that allows the child to absorb cultural knowledge and skills necessary for adulthood. Free play is vital in developing physical, cognitive, and social skills. Attunement is face-to-face interactions with peers that are critical for social emotional development. Social learning develops when children observe each other and model each other’s behavior. Finally, sensitive periods are windows of time during various periods of development between the ages of 9 and 15 where the brain is optimal for learning critical skills pertaining to social, cultural and identity development. Children in a play-based childhood live life in discover-mode where they are free to explore their peer relationships and physical environment through unsupervised, risk-taking activities. Here, they learn to solve conflicts, test their physical strength and learn to make alliances and bonds.
In part three Haidt’s research finds that the play-based childhood ended and in the early 2010’s the phone-based childhood and “great rewiring” began. Discover-mode turned to defend-mode where parents kept children “safe” by becoming hypervigilant of any type of threat, preventing them from experiencing challenges and hindering the development of resilience. Children began spending more time inside, preoccupying themselves with devices that provide instant entertainment and pseudo social experiences while inhibiting critical periods of development. Haidt addresses four foundational harms of a phone-based childhood: social deprivation, sleep deprivation, attention fragmentation, and addiction. Girls are at greater risk of harm by social media while boys tend to disengage from real-world communities and engage in a false sense of reality in endless virtual networks. Haidt also explores the toll technology has taken on the spiritual well-being of both children and adults. There has been a decline in shared rituals, finding awe in nature, and a quickness to anger and a resistance to forgive. The increased exposure to degrading content in the phone-based world has pulled us away from finding meaning and purpose in the outside world.
The final part of The Anxious Generation provides resources and suggestions for adults to reverse the impact of the phone-based childhood. The author suggests educators and school administrators have a “phone-free” environment where all phones are locked up for the entirety of the day. He suggests increasing outside play with less adult-led activities and more child-led, play based groups where children are provided “loose parts” to create, build, and explore. Haidt provides suggestions and supports for parents that include scaffolding their child’s independence for ages 0-5 years, 6- 12 years and 13-18 years. In both the schools and homes, he encourages adults to “link up”, to find others who believe children should have less access to the internet and more access to opportunities that promote healthy, well-rounded development.
EVALUATION
Haidt uses thorough, evidence-based research to show the impact on children when they have a virtual world in the palm of their hands. Their development becomes deprived of necessary experiences and their ability to interact with peers, take risks, learn resiliency, and develop a sense of purpose becomes stunted. Children become reliant on how many “likes” they have from strangers to determine their worth and they become anxious, obsessive, and depressed when their post doesn’t produce enough “thumbs up”. “Unsupervised outdoor play teaches children how to handle risks and challenges of many kinds. By building physical, psychological, and social competence, it gives kids confidence that they can face new situations, which is an inoculation against anxiety” (71). In a world that makes solutions complicated, expensive and political, Haidt advocates for two simple solutions to the problem, get our children outside and prevent phone use in schools. The book contains metaphors that help the reader understand the significant impact of a phone-based childhood. Common sense sets in and we can say “we didn’t know what we didn’t know” about the dangers of letting our children explore an unknown territory but now that we know the research and see the impact, we have the power to reverse the problem.
THIS BOOK IS APPLICABLE FOR THE FOLLOWING:
-Educators and school administrators:
“There is a Polynesian expression: ‘Standing on a whale, fishing for minnows.’ Sometimes what you are looking for is right there, underfoot, and it is better than anything you can find by looking farther away. I suggested two potential whales that schools can implement right away, with little or no additional money: going phone-free, and becoming more play-full” (Haidt 265).
-Parents:
“Being a parent is always a challenge, and it has become far more challenging in our era of rapid social and technological change. However, there is a lot that parents can do to become better “gardeners”-those who create a space in which their children can learn and grow-in contrast to “carpenters” who try to mold and shape their children directly” (Haidt 286).
-Therapists and parent educators:
“A free-range childhood is more likely to produce confident, competent young adults, with lower levels of anxiety, than in a childhood ruled by safteyism, fear, and constant adult supervision. The biggest obstacle is the parent’s own anxiety about letting a child out of sight, unchaperoned by an adult. This takes practice, but the ultimate pleasure of being able to trust your child outweighs the temporary anxieties of letting go” (Haidt, 287).
-Advocates for policy change:
Resources for those who would like to become part of the movement can visit:
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