21 ms·

Teens' anxiety levels dropped during pandemic, study finds

250 points by dependenttypes 6y ago

mschuster91 6y ago
It's only surprising for old people who have been unwilling to listen to complaints of school children for years now. The list of problems that schools face (overcrowding, parental pressure, curricula packed with superfluous stuff no one will ever need again, curricula not even close to incorporating modern technology, buildings obviously in disrepair, way too early start times) is long, and it hasn't shrunk for years now.
- konjin 6y ago
  At this point we might as well admit that schools are daycare for teens. And universities are daycare for adolescents. So lets cut the bullshit and focus on what matters, keeping kids occupied and keeping them from killing themselves. I suggest medically induced commas for 8 hours a day. It's quite a safe technology with minimal long term negative effects.
  - sideshowb 6y ago
    > I suggest medically induced commas for 8 hours a day ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
  - mschuster91 6y ago
    > At this point we might as well admit that schools are daycare for teens. And universities are daycare for adolescents. So lets cut the bullshit and focus on what matters, keeping kids occupied and keeping them from killing themselves. You're getting downvoted for the coma comment, but this here is spot on. When the schools got locked down because of the 'rona, the most pressing problem for parents was that they had no place to put their kid into or a way to care for the kids themselves because rents these days require that both parents work...
    - konjin 6y ago
      >You're getting downvoted for the coma comment It was just a modest proposal.
    - ip26 6y ago
      Another problem faced has been that houses are hot during the day, and now that you are home in the afternoons, houses without A/C are suddenly less livable in many locales. So really, let's focus on what matters, the original point of holding down a job was clearly to enjoy the A/C at the office.
- henriquemaia 6y ago
  The system has been broken for long, but never so broken that it actually demands a top to bottom reform. Besides, those who suffer with it the most either don't vote or have little political relevance or maturity to make a stand. And parents are not good mediators, since they tend to focus on the outcomes, not the day to day life of the student. That's how you reach the unfortunate situation we have today.
  - dependenttypes 6y ago
    > those who suffer with it the most either don't vote I do not think that countries where people under 18 years old can vote are common. > but never so broken that it actually demands a top to bottom reform. I would challenge that, it's just that it does not affect adults which is why it has been ignored until now.
- martopix 6y ago
  I feel adults have been unwilling to listen to the problems of teenagers forever in fact. Teenage years are a difficult age, and it's really remarkable how many people I know seem to think of teenagers as spoiled, indisciplined children who should just get their shit together.
  - LandR 6y ago
    And its more incredible that they dont listen when you remember those adults were teenagers once too, and probably had very real issues that were ignored by their parents too!
    - mschuster91 6y ago
      "We had to suffer through this too, so you can too, it makes you harder!!!"
      - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
        I think it's more 'as an adult I realise that what I faced as a teenager was not all it appeared to be'. Every cohort of teenagers since ancient times has believed, it seems, that their parents didn't understand. I think then one finds the ignorance was usually balanced in the other direction. Parents in general do want their offspring to grow to be self sufficient, which does require some pain - we're not going to be here forever to care for our kids - but most parents want their kids to get through their whole life with fulfillment and happiness. Sometimes that means a little hardship for a greater life overall. This I think accounts for parents, in general, seeming to be hard on teenagers. Those teenagers will either realise it was for good or initiate a revolution in how they treat their own teens. That revolution hasn't happened yet. My observation is that we go in cycles - parents are liberal, their children are more conservative (when they become parents), so their children respond by being more liberal, etc..
        kenjackson 6y ago
        I don’t think we go in cycles. It seems that we continuously get more liberal. At some point we may hit a steady state where we cycle, but we haven’t so far.
ycombinete 6y ago
I've known very few teenagers who wouldn't prefer statying at home, to going to school. School is hard for so many reasons. I'm not sure that makes it unecessary, or bad.
ElectronEsq 6y ago
This is a misleading headline by the BBC. The study is for anxiety of school, not anxiety in general. Now that people are at home, of course they are going to be less anxious of schooling. Quote: “With children and young people having been out of the classroom for so long, and with many students in this study seeing improvements in mental health and wellbeing during that time, the case to address issues weighing on their quality of life at school is stronger than ever.” https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/anxiety-in-young-teens-dropped-during-lockdown-bristol-university-study-reveals-1/ https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/anxiety-in...
- gverrilla 6y ago
  anxiety is anxiety is anxiety. the causes/sources/contexts may vary, but the phenomenom is the same. The title is not misleading.
- boomlinde 6y ago
  That quote doesn't corroborate your conclusion. I suppose it could be misinterpreted, and a better phrasing would be something like this: "With children and young people having been out of the classroom for so long, and with many students in this study seeing improvements in mental health and wellbeing during that time, the case to address issues at school weighing on their quality of life is stronger than ever." When in doubt, consult the primary source: https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peoples-Mental-Health-during-the-COVID-19-Pandemic-Report.pdf https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peo... Quote: "Compared to pre-pandemic, there was an overall decrease in risk of anxiety, and an increase in wellbeing but no large change in risk of depression"
- gowld 6y ago
  > The study is for anxiety of school, not anxiety in general. I seen no evidence for that claim, in either article.
- ElectronEsq 6y ago
  Quote: "A first-of-its-kind report by the University of Bristol reveals younger teenagers across the South West felt less anxious and more connected to school when they were away from it during the Covid-19 lockdown." Note: "felt less anxious and more connected to school when they were away from it". Note: "school" Note: "when they were away from it"
emerongi 6y ago
My opinion on school, coming from someone living in Europe: - Homework should be abolished - School should start at a reasonable time. In my opinion, 8AM is too early. Kids that live far away have to wake up at 6AM, which is not a normal time judging by when kids wake up during summer break (9-10AM). 9AM would be acceptable. Not sure how much it would affect teachers' lives though. - Kids should be made aware of the psychological help they can receive if they have personal issues. We had a psychologist at school, but I don't think anyone consulted them. - Kids should be taught practical life skills over random trivia. Housework (fixing things, cleaning etc), finance, time management, how to actually learn/study effectively, mental health awareness, working out with correct technique and not ruining your body, how to eat healthily are all things that I value more than knowing the intricate details of how the European Union came to be (knowing history is useful and interesting, but I'd have rather spent that time on the aforementioned things). Of course, a lot of kids are going to complain many things in this list are boring, but they will value them once they grow older. PE in my school didn't teach any theory, which is just stupid looking back. Our body is with us for the rest of our lives, we should have the knowledge of how to take care of it. Also, certain degree of freedom is something that everyone wants and values in their life. It would probably be expensive and hard, but if possible, I'd try to give kids a way to choose a small part of their study path.
- agent008t 6y ago
  Homework is very important. It gets you to practice intrinsic motivation - getting things done in your own time when nobody is forcing you to do them and when you have other, more appealing alternatives.
  - mrob 6y ago
    Most kids only do homework because they'll be punished if they don't. That's not intrinsic motivation.
    - iso947 6y ago
      Most people only do jobs because they don’t want to starve.
majkinetor 6y ago
Ofc it does. During the NATO bombing of Serbia 20+ years ago, for us, teens, life was never better - no school, no work, parents worrying about basic stuff (i.e. not us) - just plenty of outside socializing and random activity. Everybody remembers that as good old times :) I can imagine the same to be true now, not to that extent.
- read_if_gay_ 6y ago
  Well, there’s not exactly plenty of socializing and activity right now.
  - km3k 6y ago
    There's still a lot of outdoor and online activities going on. There's much less indoor activities and outdoor activities with big groups or in close proximity, but there's still a lot of activities going on.
  - war1025 6y ago
    You'd be surprised. My general feeling (which includes my own family's behavior) is that people have returned to hanging out with whoever they used to. They just don't go to restaurants or other social settings to do it. There aren't "organized" activities, but I see kids out playing on my street every single evening. Honestly it's refreshing to see kids behaving organically for once instead of their parents shuttling them from one activity to the next.
    - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
      True. Things have gotten better, but for a few months nothing really happened at all, at least where I live. I don’t think that was a good time except for those kids that spend all their time playing videogames anyway, which would’ve included me when I was in school, but not most people.
      - war1025 6y ago
        > for a few months nothing really happened at all, at least where I live. I suppose the impact probably also depends on age and the number of siblings. We've got three that are two years apart and preschool aged. They were able to entertain each other pretty well through it all. I could see it being a much bigger issue for only children or kids that have a bigger age gap between them.
Aerroon 6y ago
As a teenager I liked being sick, because it allowed me to stay home from school and gave an exemption from PE classes for a week or two. Feeling awful physically seemed like a small price to pay for that. It doesn't at all surprise me that teenagers feel better when they don't have to go to school.
gridlockd 6y ago
I used to be rather anxious during some of my school years, dreading all the social interactions I would be forced into, with people that I did not want to be part of my life. I think that's normal and perhaps a necessary part of human development. I'm fine now, at least.
- refurb 6y ago
  I agree it’s an uncomfortable, but necessary part of human development. One of the worst things you can do for your mental health is avoid uncomfortable feelings. All that usually accomplishes is making those feelings even worse. That’s why exposure therapy is such a big part in dealing with phobias and anxiety. It’s counter intuitive, but being stressed and anxious (within reason) helps you develop coping mechanisms that come in really handy in life.
  - waterhouse 6y ago
    Wiki: "Exposure therapy is based on the principle of respondent conditioning often termed Pavlovian extinction.[16] The exposure therapist identifies the cognitions, emotions and physiological arousal that accompany a fear-inducing stimulus and then tries to break the pattern of escape that maintains the fear. This is done by exposing the patient to progressively stronger fear-inducing stimuli.[17] Fear is minimized at each of a series of steadily escalating steps or challenges (a hierarchy), which can be explicit ("static") or implicit ("dynamic" — see Method of Factors) until the fear is finally gone.[18] The patient is able to terminate the procedure at any time." I think there are some key differences between the above and what school permits.
  - everdrive 6y ago
    It's a tough problem conceptually. At some point you "grow up" and your fears, biases, and immaturities are crystallized. What is the difference between a preference, and something that you must overcome to mature? To me it seems (mostly) arbitrary. The distinction primarily being that once you're an adult, you can choose when to remain comfortable, and when to keep pushing yourself. When you're a child, it's forced on you. And for sure, a child who was never put outside of his comfort zone would make a bad adult. It's just hard to know until hindsight. Some things are simple bad, and should be avoided, but other things are immaturities, and you could grow out of them.
whywhywhywhy 6y ago
Struggle to think of something more cruel and with less value you could legally subject children to than public schooling. If one good thing comes out of 2020 it will hopefully be a mass realisation that you shouldn't be entrusting your child's future to these people. If the whole of schooling can be replaced by a few videocalls during 2020, what value was it ever really providing.
- AlgorithmicTime 6y ago
  It's providing babysitting. Children go to school so parents can go to work.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  Well, I don't think the value of schools has been replaced by video calls, at all. That's just all we've been able to do. You could live on water and plain crackers for some time, but that doesn't mean it's a complete, healthy, nourishing, replacement for a normal diet.
- waterhouse 6y ago
  It will be fascinating to see the studies years from now. Comparing things like people who graduated in 2019 vs those who graduated in 2020 (a few months of school disrupted) vs 2021 (more than a year of school disrupted). There may be difficult confounders to deal with, like "the economy also changed a lot due to the pandemic", so it's hard to compare across years; "having already found a job before the pandemic" would also be significant, so it's hard to compare differently-aged people during the same year. The best would be something like comparing people from different U.S. states or cities that are roughly similar, but one city shut down school much longer than the other. (Perhaps even comparing schools, although "whether a school decided to err on the side of staying shut down" probably correlates with something that would affect kids' performance.) Anyway, let me pre-register my prediction that, if good studies can be done, they will show that kids who were forced to miss a year of school (or in-person school, at least) will not have been measurably negatively impacted by it.
- kenjackson 6y ago
  If anything 2020 has shown us how valuable school is.
jmiskovic 6y ago
Babysitting children is a huge value for society, and it's how schools were formed in the first place. Video schooling had limited success in teaching grade material, but I feel it was mostly put in place to maintain continuity and upkeep pupils' habits. Maybe now's the right time to talk on how to improve public schooling, or what to replace it with.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  >and it's how schools were formed in the first place // I'd be pretty sure that wasn't true. If you're thinking towards our tribal ancestors then I'd expect that children would be brought on with skills and work as quickly as possible in order to strengthen the tribe. The oldest school establishments in the UK - from Late Antiquity/Early Middle Ages - certainly weren't for "babysitting" (ie provision of nutrition and as much care as needed to prevent injury).
- cblconfederate 6y ago
  > schools were formed in the first place. you mean how they ended up. babysitting wasn't an issue when public schooling started
throwaway77384 6y ago
As a kid I literally preferred being hospitalised for weeks on end to school. As bizarre as that may sound, hospital was like a refuge for me. And school wasn't even that bad.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  In which country were you in hospital? Did you have tutoring, or work sent from school teachers?
- gowld 6y ago
  Hospital costs 20x as much as school, and it was a temporary condition, and you made no comparison of long-term impacts of education.
Solstinox 6y ago
In the 1980s they built a biodome out in the middle of the desert and planted trees inside of it. The trees would grow faster than anticipated and then come crashing down. Turns out without the stressor of wind, trees look happier, at first, but do not build the strong stress wood needed to support their natural height.
- dependenttypes 6y ago
  If anything this is an argument to let the kids be taught by their parents and let the kids help with the parents work like the "good old days" rather than in the biodomes that are schools.
  - Solstinox 6y ago
    You need a proper dose of the right kind of stressor for the person. I don’t know what’s proper and right for each person, but it’s worth avoiding the simple assumption that “stress/anxiety = bad thing, therefore less stress/anxiety = good thing.”
    - alexbanks 6y ago
      You're not wrong, but I disagree a lot with your metaphor. Measuring stress and anxiety is important for mental health. The solutions are not necessarily binary, but the measurement is important.
- weregiraffe 6y ago
  People are not trees
  - Solstinox 6y ago
    You’re right, we’re even more adaptive than trees.
- scornflakes 6y ago
  Framing anxiety as the wind in this analogy, I'd say the _unnatural_ amount of social concerns we impose on children---and people as a whole---is more like growing trees in a wind tunnel. Yeah, anxiety is a natural response. And we've developed biological mechanisms to adapt to it. But the application of anxiety has changed _so much_ in just the last few centuries. Anxiety sources have proliferated. Beyond food and shelter, we have anxieties about grades, waking up early, approval from peers, et cetera. This compounds, especially if you come from a family that struggles to even provide food and shelter. Children are also then told they live in a meritocracy and therefore should internalize their shortcomings and bad marks. I digress, but I don't think we can appeal to nature and argue our current situation as natural. We can be doing better.
vepolek 6y ago
Anyone interested in this should definitely read John Taylor Gatto. His book 'Dumbing Us Down' gives a good overview about how school influences children.
techaddicted 6y ago
That was to be expected. Less stress in school, less bullying and so on. Interestingly, my anxiety has risen dramatically during the pandemic, because of the fear of job loss.
gowld 6y ago
> Rebecca from Cardiff, who has a son aged 14 with Asperger's Syndrome and a 12-year-old boy who is also on the autism spectrum, said both children were happy before but the drop in their stress levels has been "unbelievable". This is a common anecdote. Aspies report being more comfortable and less bullied at virtual school vs physical school.
x87678r 6y ago
My daughter wasn't anxious but lonely and depressed. Would have been great to get stats on that.
nvarsj 6y ago
It's not really surprising to anyone I think. School is hell for lots of teenagers. You're forced into a prison like setting with strict rules and little freedom, and you're forced to interact with a huge number of immature people of similar age - of whom the chances are a few will make your life hell, and you have no choice in getting away from it. I would have been 100% happier as a kid if I could have simply done my education on my own or virtually, and spent my time with people I actually enjoyed the company of. Sort of what it's like to be an adult actually. The modern school system is such a terrible model.
- dcolkitt 6y ago
  The other issue to consider is that the vast majority of American high schools have start times that are far too early for the typical teenager's circadian rhythm.[1] Sleep deprivation has a major effect on generalized anxiety[2]. The research I would like to see done, is to test whether the groups of students with the earliest starting schools saw larger drops in anxiety during the transition to full remote. [1]https://www.cdc.gov/sleep/features/schools-start-too-early.html https://www.cdc.gov/sleep/features/schools-start-too-early.h... [2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005791610000315 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00057...
- abyssin 6y ago
  A big part of what makes school uncomfortable is related to the physical space in which it takes place. As you said it, it has many attributes of a prison. Too crowded, which means too noisy. Closed, which means there's no room for breathing when things get socially too heated. Little privacy. In many places of the world, included rich ones, schools are in a state of disrepair. And in general, they display a situation where users have no input in the design process.
- badrabbit 6y ago
  American schools resemble actual prisons in many ways. From the architecture of buildings to the freezing temperature (prisoners fight less when cold) they are shockingly similar. And they have to wake up unnaturrally early. I think it all comes down to how students are seen by architects and the school system in general. I wonder if private schools are different.
pjdemers 6y ago
Sitting around the house playing video games and watching netflix all day makes teenagers happier than going to school, getting some exercise and having a job? What a revelation.
everdrive 6y ago
This shouldn't be too surprising. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avP8IyKw5_w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avP8IyKw5_w
pwinnski 6y ago
Wow, the claim that increases in teen suicide would be greater than COVID-19 deaths looks even more silly now than it did then, which was already pretty silly.
- stateofnounion 6y ago
  Did you even read the study? Risk of depression was not affected and suicide wasn't even a factor that was considered. > Compared to pre-pandemic, there was an overall decrease in risk of anxiety, and an increase in wellbeing but no large change in risk of depression https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peoples-Mental-Health-during-the-COVID-19-Pandemic-Report.pdf https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peo... Also, for all of the extremely attentive readers like pwinnski out there, I'm sure they've already come across research on increased rates of suicide due to economic despair https://wellbeingtrust.org/areas-of-focus/policy-and-advocacy/reports/projected-deaths-of-despair-during-covid-19/ https://wellbeingtrust.org/areas-of-focus/policy-and-advocac...
  - pwinnski 6y ago
    I read this in the article "There was a 2% decrease in boys at risk of depression and a 3% increase in girls at risk of depression" but I guess that's not considered a "large" change. The study also reported specifically that "Students at risk of depression pre-pandemic showed a reduction in depression scores in comparison to students with no depression pre-pandemic (HADS score of 0-6) who showed an small increase in depression scores." So it was the very students most likely to be depressed before the pandemic that are doing (slightly) better, and the small increase (from 3.0 to 3.9) does not raise students into the range considered most dangerous (7+) Please try to avoid personal jabs and rule-breaking questions, thanks.
  - pwinnski 6y ago
    The projection of increased suicide in that study is based primarily on unemployment rate, but unemployment in 2020 is considerably different from unemployment in 2018 (the year they used as a baseline) due to unusual federal benefits that left as many as 68% earning more while unemployed than they did while working[0]. Actual suicide rates do to seem yet to be climbing as predicted, although it will take some time to see what the actual deleterious events turn out to be. [0] up to 68% https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-getting-more-money-from-unemployment-than-they-were-from-their-jobs/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-gett... or 47% https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/47-percent-will-make-more-money-collecting-unemployment-than-working-301037896.html https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/47-percent-will-mak... https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanguina/2020/04/28/some-earning-more-money-on-unemployment-than-while-working/#5e9848696095 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanguina/2020/04/28/some-earni...
baby 6y ago
The only reason I got through highschool is that I realized that nothing would happen if I skipped classes. From then on, I would wake up in the morning, pretend I would go to class, go to the Virgin megastore instead and read manga all day. Of course I would still go to exams, and of course they ended up calling my parents a number of times, but it worked out in the end. I passed the exams, and I went to uni.
rainyMammoth 6y ago
I realized a long time ago that school is really organized babysitting so that Adults can go over their day without worrying about their kids. High school was hell for me. I guess a point can be made that it makes you learn life the hard way.
whalesalad 6y ago
I can only imagine how awesome it is to be a teenager right now. You have a natural advantage against the virus due to your age, and you/your buds don't need to attend school. Fire up the Xbox and grab your Mtn Dew boys it's time to drop into Verdansk.
jedberg 6y ago
A lot of folks in here are pointing out that this makes sense because the kids get to wake up later. We'll soon have some real data on this. California passed a law last year that requires high school start after 8:30 am. Schools have until the 2022 school year to implement the law, which means we'll have a natural case study as different schools implement it this year (once we return to in person school) and next year and the year after.
jppope 6y ago
Public School is bad for kids. The question is how do we fix the problem. ...Worth noting there were no school shootings for the first time in decades in March (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-first-march-without-school-shooting-since-2002-united-states/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-first-march-without...)
k__ 6y ago
Mine too. Now I can always say "can't come, better safe than sorry!" and nobody bats an eye. Before, it was always frowned upon if I didn't want to meet someone.
pm24601 6y ago
In other news, parents stress goes up dramatically and teacher stress rises. Thus it is proven that: 1. The total sum of stress is an invariant 2. teachers are a parental stress sink
runawaybottle 6y ago
I wonder if we can measure anxiety vs self reporting. That would be a wild study to give everyone a band that tracks heartbeat and hopefully one other obvious measurable symptom of anxiety and just see the large scale data of how certain jobs/school etc cause outsized amount of anxiety (with mostly undeniable measured data).
reportgunner 6y ago
Who is paying for these studies ? Are we going to find out that the sky is blue too based on 1000 pictures from south west England too ?
powerapple 6y ago
my own anxiety level has dropped during pandemic as well :)

It's only surprising for old people who have been unwilling to listen to complaints of school children for years now. The list of problems that schools face (overcrowding, parental pressure, curricula packed with superfluous stuff no one will ever need again, curricula not even close to incorporating modern technology, buildings obviously in disrepair, way too early start times) is long, and it hasn't shrunk for years now.

konjin 6y ago
At this point we might as well admit that schools are daycare for teens. And universities are daycare for adolescents. So lets cut the bullshit and focus on what matters, keeping kids occupied and keeping them from killing themselves. I suggest medically induced commas for 8 hours a day. It's quite a safe technology with minimal long term negative effects.
- sideshowb 6y ago
  > I suggest medically induced commas for 8 hours a day ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
- mschuster91 6y ago
  > At this point we might as well admit that schools are daycare for teens. And universities are daycare for adolescents. So lets cut the bullshit and focus on what matters, keeping kids occupied and keeping them from killing themselves. You're getting downvoted for the coma comment, but this here is spot on. When the schools got locked down because of the 'rona, the most pressing problem for parents was that they had no place to put their kid into or a way to care for the kids themselves because rents these days require that both parents work...
  - konjin 6y ago
    >You're getting downvoted for the coma comment It was just a modest proposal.
  - ip26 6y ago
    Another problem faced has been that houses are hot during the day, and now that you are home in the afternoons, houses without A/C are suddenly less livable in many locales. So really, let's focus on what matters, the original point of holding down a job was clearly to enjoy the A/C at the office.
henriquemaia 6y ago
The system has been broken for long, but never so broken that it actually demands a top to bottom reform. Besides, those who suffer with it the most either don't vote or have little political relevance or maturity to make a stand. And parents are not good mediators, since they tend to focus on the outcomes, not the day to day life of the student. That's how you reach the unfortunate situation we have today.
- dependenttypes 6y ago
  > those who suffer with it the most either don't vote I do not think that countries where people under 18 years old can vote are common. > but never so broken that it actually demands a top to bottom reform. I would challenge that, it's just that it does not affect adults which is why it has been ignored until now.
martopix 6y ago
I feel adults have been unwilling to listen to the problems of teenagers forever in fact. Teenage years are a difficult age, and it's really remarkable how many people I know seem to think of teenagers as spoiled, indisciplined children who should just get their shit together.
- LandR 6y ago
  And its more incredible that they dont listen when you remember those adults were teenagers once too, and probably had very real issues that were ignored by their parents too!
  - mschuster91 6y ago
    "We had to suffer through this too, so you can too, it makes you harder!!!"
    - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
      I think it's more 'as an adult I realise that what I faced as a teenager was not all it appeared to be'. Every cohort of teenagers since ancient times has believed, it seems, that their parents didn't understand. I think then one finds the ignorance was usually balanced in the other direction. Parents in general do want their offspring to grow to be self sufficient, which does require some pain - we're not going to be here forever to care for our kids - but most parents want their kids to get through their whole life with fulfillment and happiness. Sometimes that means a little hardship for a greater life overall. This I think accounts for parents, in general, seeming to be hard on teenagers. Those teenagers will either realise it was for good or initiate a revolution in how they treat their own teens. That revolution hasn't happened yet. My observation is that we go in cycles - parents are liberal, their children are more conservative (when they become parents), so their children respond by being more liberal, etc..
      - kenjackson 6y ago
        I don’t think we go in cycles. It seems that we continuously get more liberal. At some point we may hit a steady state where we cycle, but we haven’t so far.

ycombinete 6y ago

I've known very few teenagers who wouldn't prefer statying at home, to going to school. School is hard for so many reasons. I'm not sure that makes it unecessary, or bad.

ElectronEsq 6y ago

This is a misleading headline by the BBC. The study is for anxiety of school, not anxiety in general. Now that people are at home, of course they are going to be less anxious of schooling. Quote: “With children and young people having been out of the classroom for so long, and with many students in this study seeing improvements in mental health and wellbeing during that time, the case to address issues weighing on their quality of life at school is stronger than ever.” https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/anxiety-in-young-teens-dropped-during-lockdown-bristol-university-study-reveals-1/ https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/anxiety-in...

gverrilla 6y ago
anxiety is anxiety is anxiety. the causes/sources/contexts may vary, but the phenomenom is the same. The title is not misleading.
boomlinde 6y ago
That quote doesn't corroborate your conclusion. I suppose it could be misinterpreted, and a better phrasing would be something like this: "With children and young people having been out of the classroom for so long, and with many students in this study seeing improvements in mental health and wellbeing during that time, the case to address issues at school weighing on their quality of life is stronger than ever." When in doubt, consult the primary source: https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peoples-Mental-Health-during-the-COVID-19-Pandemic-Report.pdf https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peo... Quote: "Compared to pre-pandemic, there was an overall decrease in risk of anxiety, and an increase in wellbeing but no large change in risk of depression"
gowld 6y ago
> The study is for anxiety of school, not anxiety in general. I seen no evidence for that claim, in either article.
ElectronEsq 6y ago
Quote: "A first-of-its-kind report by the University of Bristol reveals younger teenagers across the South West felt less anxious and more connected to school when they were away from it during the Covid-19 lockdown." Note: "felt less anxious and more connected to school when they were away from it". Note: "school" Note: "when they were away from it"

emerongi 6y ago

My opinion on school, coming from someone living in Europe: - Homework should be abolished - School should start at a reasonable time. In my opinion, 8AM is too early. Kids that live far away have to wake up at 6AM, which is not a normal time judging by when kids wake up during summer break (9-10AM). 9AM would be acceptable. Not sure how much it would affect teachers' lives though. - Kids should be made aware of the psychological help they can receive if they have personal issues. We had a psychologist at school, but I don't think anyone consulted them. - Kids should be taught practical life skills over random trivia. Housework (fixing things, cleaning etc), finance, time management, how to actually learn/study effectively, mental health awareness, working out with correct technique and not ruining your body, how to eat healthily are all things that I value more than knowing the intricate details of how the European Union came to be (knowing history is useful and interesting, but I'd have rather spent that time on the aforementioned things). Of course, a lot of kids are going to complain many things in this list are boring, but they will value them once they grow older. PE in my school didn't teach any theory, which is just stupid looking back. Our body is with us for the rest of our lives, we should have the knowledge of how to take care of it. Also, certain degree of freedom is something that everyone wants and values in their life. It would probably be expensive and hard, but if possible, I'd try to give kids a way to choose a small part of their study path.

agent008t 6y ago
Homework is very important. It gets you to practice intrinsic motivation - getting things done in your own time when nobody is forcing you to do them and when you have other, more appealing alternatives.
- mrob 6y ago
  Most kids only do homework because they'll be punished if they don't. That's not intrinsic motivation.
  - iso947 6y ago
    Most people only do jobs because they don’t want to starve.

majkinetor 6y ago

Ofc it does. During the NATO bombing of Serbia 20+ years ago, for us, teens, life was never better - no school, no work, parents worrying about basic stuff (i.e. not us) - just plenty of outside socializing and random activity. Everybody remembers that as good old times :) I can imagine the same to be true now, not to that extent.

read_if_gay_ 6y ago
Well, there’s not exactly plenty of socializing and activity right now.
- km3k 6y ago
  There's still a lot of outdoor and online activities going on. There's much less indoor activities and outdoor activities with big groups or in close proximity, but there's still a lot of activities going on.
- war1025 6y ago
  You'd be surprised. My general feeling (which includes my own family's behavior) is that people have returned to hanging out with whoever they used to. They just don't go to restaurants or other social settings to do it. There aren't "organized" activities, but I see kids out playing on my street every single evening. Honestly it's refreshing to see kids behaving organically for once instead of their parents shuttling them from one activity to the next.
  - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
    True. Things have gotten better, but for a few months nothing really happened at all, at least where I live. I don’t think that was a good time except for those kids that spend all their time playing videogames anyway, which would’ve included me when I was in school, but not most people.
    - war1025 6y ago
      > for a few months nothing really happened at all, at least where I live. I suppose the impact probably also depends on age and the number of siblings. We've got three that are two years apart and preschool aged. They were able to entertain each other pretty well through it all. I could see it being a much bigger issue for only children or kids that have a bigger age gap between them.

Aerroon 6y ago

As a teenager I liked being sick, because it allowed me to stay home from school and gave an exemption from PE classes for a week or two. Feeling awful physically seemed like a small price to pay for that. It doesn't at all surprise me that teenagers feel better when they don't have to go to school.

gridlockd 6y ago

I used to be rather anxious during some of my school years, dreading all the social interactions I would be forced into, with people that I did not want to be part of my life. I think that's normal and perhaps a necessary part of human development. I'm fine now, at least.

refurb 6y ago
I agree it’s an uncomfortable, but necessary part of human development. One of the worst things you can do for your mental health is avoid uncomfortable feelings. All that usually accomplishes is making those feelings even worse. That’s why exposure therapy is such a big part in dealing with phobias and anxiety. It’s counter intuitive, but being stressed and anxious (within reason) helps you develop coping mechanisms that come in really handy in life.
- waterhouse 6y ago
  Wiki: "Exposure therapy is based on the principle of respondent conditioning often termed Pavlovian extinction.[16] The exposure therapist identifies the cognitions, emotions and physiological arousal that accompany a fear-inducing stimulus and then tries to break the pattern of escape that maintains the fear. This is done by exposing the patient to progressively stronger fear-inducing stimuli.[17] Fear is minimized at each of a series of steadily escalating steps or challenges (a hierarchy), which can be explicit ("static") or implicit ("dynamic" — see Method of Factors) until the fear is finally gone.[18] The patient is able to terminate the procedure at any time." I think there are some key differences between the above and what school permits.
- everdrive 6y ago
  It's a tough problem conceptually. At some point you "grow up" and your fears, biases, and immaturities are crystallized. What is the difference between a preference, and something that you must overcome to mature? To me it seems (mostly) arbitrary. The distinction primarily being that once you're an adult, you can choose when to remain comfortable, and when to keep pushing yourself. When you're a child, it's forced on you. And for sure, a child who was never put outside of his comfort zone would make a bad adult. It's just hard to know until hindsight. Some things are simple bad, and should be avoided, but other things are immaturities, and you could grow out of them.

whywhywhywhy 6y ago

Struggle to think of something more cruel and with less value you could legally subject children to than public schooling. If one good thing comes out of 2020 it will hopefully be a mass realisation that you shouldn't be entrusting your child's future to these people. If the whole of schooling can be replaced by a few videocalls during 2020, what value was it ever really providing.

AlgorithmicTime 6y ago
It's providing babysitting. Children go to school so parents can go to work.
pbhjpbhj 6y ago
Well, I don't think the value of schools has been replaced by video calls, at all. That's just all we've been able to do. You could live on water and plain crackers for some time, but that doesn't mean it's a complete, healthy, nourishing, replacement for a normal diet.
waterhouse 6y ago
It will be fascinating to see the studies years from now. Comparing things like people who graduated in 2019 vs those who graduated in 2020 (a few months of school disrupted) vs 2021 (more than a year of school disrupted). There may be difficult confounders to deal with, like "the economy also changed a lot due to the pandemic", so it's hard to compare across years; "having already found a job before the pandemic" would also be significant, so it's hard to compare differently-aged people during the same year. The best would be something like comparing people from different U.S. states or cities that are roughly similar, but one city shut down school much longer than the other. (Perhaps even comparing schools, although "whether a school decided to err on the side of staying shut down" probably correlates with something that would affect kids' performance.) Anyway, let me pre-register my prediction that, if good studies can be done, they will show that kids who were forced to miss a year of school (or in-person school, at least) will not have been measurably negatively impacted by it.
kenjackson 6y ago
If anything 2020 has shown us how valuable school is.

jmiskovic 6y ago

Babysitting children is a huge value for society, and it's how schools were formed in the first place. Video schooling had limited success in teaching grade material, but I feel it was mostly put in place to maintain continuity and upkeep pupils' habits. Maybe now's the right time to talk on how to improve public schooling, or what to replace it with.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago
>and it's how schools were formed in the first place // I'd be pretty sure that wasn't true. If you're thinking towards our tribal ancestors then I'd expect that children would be brought on with skills and work as quickly as possible in order to strengthen the tribe. The oldest school establishments in the UK - from Late Antiquity/Early Middle Ages - certainly weren't for "babysitting" (ie provision of nutrition and as much care as needed to prevent injury).
cblconfederate 6y ago
> schools were formed in the first place. you mean how they ended up. babysitting wasn't an issue when public schooling started

throwaway77384 6y ago

As a kid I literally preferred being hospitalised for weeks on end to school. As bizarre as that may sound, hospital was like a refuge for me. And school wasn't even that bad.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago
In which country were you in hospital? Did you have tutoring, or work sent from school teachers?
gowld 6y ago
Hospital costs 20x as much as school, and it was a temporary condition, and you made no comparison of long-term impacts of education.

Solstinox 6y ago

In the 1980s they built a biodome out in the middle of the desert and planted trees inside of it. The trees would grow faster than anticipated and then come crashing down. Turns out without the stressor of wind, trees look happier, at first, but do not build the strong stress wood needed to support their natural height.

dependenttypes 6y ago
If anything this is an argument to let the kids be taught by their parents and let the kids help with the parents work like the "good old days" rather than in the biodomes that are schools.
- Solstinox 6y ago
  You need a proper dose of the right kind of stressor for the person. I don’t know what’s proper and right for each person, but it’s worth avoiding the simple assumption that “stress/anxiety = bad thing, therefore less stress/anxiety = good thing.”
  - alexbanks 6y ago
    You're not wrong, but I disagree a lot with your metaphor. Measuring stress and anxiety is important for mental health. The solutions are not necessarily binary, but the measurement is important.
weregiraffe 6y ago
People are not trees
- Solstinox 6y ago
  You’re right, we’re even more adaptive than trees.
scornflakes 6y ago
Framing anxiety as the wind in this analogy, I'd say the _unnatural_ amount of social concerns we impose on children---and people as a whole---is more like growing trees in a wind tunnel. Yeah, anxiety is a natural response. And we've developed biological mechanisms to adapt to it. But the application of anxiety has changed _so much_ in just the last few centuries. Anxiety sources have proliferated. Beyond food and shelter, we have anxieties about grades, waking up early, approval from peers, et cetera. This compounds, especially if you come from a family that struggles to even provide food and shelter. Children are also then told they live in a meritocracy and therefore should internalize their shortcomings and bad marks. I digress, but I don't think we can appeal to nature and argue our current situation as natural. We can be doing better.

vepolek 6y ago

Anyone interested in this should definitely read John Taylor Gatto. His book 'Dumbing Us Down' gives a good overview about how school influences children.

techaddicted 6y ago

That was to be expected. Less stress in school, less bullying and so on. Interestingly, my anxiety has risen dramatically during the pandemic, because of the fear of job loss.

gowld 6y ago

> Rebecca from Cardiff, who has a son aged 14 with Asperger's Syndrome and a 12-year-old boy who is also on the autism spectrum, said both children were happy before but the drop in their stress levels has been "unbelievable". This is a common anecdote. Aspies report being more comfortable and less bullied at virtual school vs physical school.

x87678r 6y ago

My daughter wasn't anxious but lonely and depressed. Would have been great to get stats on that.

nvarsj 6y ago

It's not really surprising to anyone I think. School is hell for lots of teenagers. You're forced into a prison like setting with strict rules and little freedom, and you're forced to interact with a huge number of immature people of similar age - of whom the chances are a few will make your life hell, and you have no choice in getting away from it. I would have been 100% happier as a kid if I could have simply done my education on my own or virtually, and spent my time with people I actually enjoyed the company of. Sort of what it's like to be an adult actually. The modern school system is such a terrible model.

dcolkitt 6y ago
The other issue to consider is that the vast majority of American high schools have start times that are far too early for the typical teenager's circadian rhythm.[1] Sleep deprivation has a major effect on generalized anxiety[2]. The research I would like to see done, is to test whether the groups of students with the earliest starting schools saw larger drops in anxiety during the transition to full remote. [1]https://www.cdc.gov/sleep/features/schools-start-too-early.html https://www.cdc.gov/sleep/features/schools-start-too-early.h... [2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005791610000315 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00057...
abyssin 6y ago
A big part of what makes school uncomfortable is related to the physical space in which it takes place. As you said it, it has many attributes of a prison. Too crowded, which means too noisy. Closed, which means there's no room for breathing when things get socially too heated. Little privacy. In many places of the world, included rich ones, schools are in a state of disrepair. And in general, they display a situation where users have no input in the design process.
badrabbit 6y ago
American schools resemble actual prisons in many ways. From the architecture of buildings to the freezing temperature (prisoners fight less when cold) they are shockingly similar. And they have to wake up unnaturrally early. I think it all comes down to how students are seen by architects and the school system in general. I wonder if private schools are different.

pjdemers 6y ago

Sitting around the house playing video games and watching netflix all day makes teenagers happier than going to school, getting some exercise and having a job? What a revelation.

everdrive 6y ago

This shouldn't be too surprising. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avP8IyKw5_w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avP8IyKw5_w

pwinnski 6y ago

Wow, the claim that increases in teen suicide would be greater than COVID-19 deaths looks even more silly now than it did then, which was already pretty silly.

stateofnounion 6y ago
Did you even read the study? Risk of depression was not affected and suicide wasn't even a factor that was considered. > Compared to pre-pandemic, there was an overall decrease in risk of anxiety, and an increase in wellbeing but no large change in risk of depression https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peoples-Mental-Health-during-the-COVID-19-Pandemic-Report.pdf https://sphr.nihr.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Young-Peo... Also, for all of the extremely attentive readers like pwinnski out there, I'm sure they've already come across research on increased rates of suicide due to economic despair https://wellbeingtrust.org/areas-of-focus/policy-and-advocacy/reports/projected-deaths-of-despair-during-covid-19/ https://wellbeingtrust.org/areas-of-focus/policy-and-advocac...
- pwinnski 6y ago
  I read this in the article "There was a 2% decrease in boys at risk of depression and a 3% increase in girls at risk of depression" but I guess that's not considered a "large" change. The study also reported specifically that "Students at risk of depression pre-pandemic showed a reduction in depression scores in comparison to students with no depression pre-pandemic (HADS score of 0-6) who showed an small increase in depression scores." So it was the very students most likely to be depressed before the pandemic that are doing (slightly) better, and the small increase (from 3.0 to 3.9) does not raise students into the range considered most dangerous (7+) Please try to avoid personal jabs and rule-breaking questions, thanks.
- pwinnski 6y ago
  The projection of increased suicide in that study is based primarily on unemployment rate, but unemployment in 2020 is considerably different from unemployment in 2018 (the year they used as a baseline) due to unusual federal benefits that left as many as 68% earning more while unemployed than they did while working[0]. Actual suicide rates do to seem yet to be climbing as predicted, although it will take some time to see what the actual deleterious events turn out to be. [0] up to 68% https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-getting-more-money-from-unemployment-than-they-were-from-their-jobs/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-gett... or 47% https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/47-percent-will-make-more-money-collecting-unemployment-than-working-301037896.html https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/47-percent-will-mak... https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanguina/2020/04/28/some-earning-more-money-on-unemployment-than-while-working/#5e9848696095 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanguina/2020/04/28/some-earni...

baby 6y ago

The only reason I got through highschool is that I realized that nothing would happen if I skipped classes. From then on, I would wake up in the morning, pretend I would go to class, go to the Virgin megastore instead and read manga all day. Of course I would still go to exams, and of course they ended up calling my parents a number of times, but it worked out in the end. I passed the exams, and I went to uni.

rainyMammoth 6y ago

I realized a long time ago that school is really organized babysitting so that Adults can go over their day without worrying about their kids. High school was hell for me. I guess a point can be made that it makes you learn life the hard way.

whalesalad 6y ago

I can only imagine how awesome it is to be a teenager right now. You have a natural advantage against the virus due to your age, and you/your buds don't need to attend school. Fire up the Xbox and grab your Mtn Dew boys it's time to drop into Verdansk.

jedberg 6y ago

A lot of folks in here are pointing out that this makes sense because the kids get to wake up later. We'll soon have some real data on this. California passed a law last year that requires high school start after 8:30 am. Schools have until the 2022 school year to implement the law, which means we'll have a natural case study as different schools implement it this year (once we return to in person school) and next year and the year after.

jppope 6y ago

Public School is bad for kids. The question is how do we fix the problem. ...Worth noting there were no school shootings for the first time in decades in March (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-first-march-without-school-shooting-since-2002-united-states/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-first-march-without...)

k__ 6y ago

Mine too. Now I can always say "can't come, better safe than sorry!" and nobody bats an eye. Before, it was always frowned upon if I didn't want to meet someone.

pm24601 6y ago

In other news, parents stress goes up dramatically and teacher stress rises. Thus it is proven that: 1. The total sum of stress is an invariant 2. teachers are a parental stress sink

runawaybottle 6y ago

I wonder if we can measure anxiety vs self reporting. That would be a wild study to give everyone a band that tracks heartbeat and hopefully one other obvious measurable symptom of anxiety and just see the large scale data of how certain jobs/school etc cause outsized amount of anxiety (with mostly undeniable measured data).

reportgunner 6y ago

Who is paying for these studies ? Are we going to find out that the sky is blue too based on 1000 pictures from south west England too ?

powerapple 6y ago

my own anxiety level has dropped during pandemic as well :)