Children’s Mental Health - Is It Getting Worse?
Is Children's Mental Health getting worse?
Young people's mental health has been affected by the pandemic. But what other factors are contributing to the decline?
Children's Mental Health
Likely, we are now seeing the long-term impacts of the pandemic on children's mental health, with over 190,000 children being referred to mental health services in 2021. According to The Children’s Society UK, in the last three years, the likelihood of a child developing a mental health problem has increased by 50% to 1/6th of those under 18’s. A report published in 2019 suggested that mental health had deteriorated significantly in the last 40 years – then the following year, the pandemic hit, and children's mental health has gotten worse since then.
For more information on youth mental health in the pandemic, check out our full blog here!
Social Media
Although there isn’t a direct link found as of yet to suggest that children’s mental health is affected by social media, there is a lot to be said about social media and self-esteem. The average amount of time a teenager spends on their phone is around 8 hours a day. While some of this will be watching videos or browsing the internet, a large proportion of it will be spent on social media.
Positives of social media
Global Connectivity: Social media transcends geographical barriers, facilitating connections with people worldwide, fostering cultural exchange and global awareness.
Information Sharing: Platforms enable the swift dissemination of news, ideas, and educational content, fostering awareness and knowledge on various subjects.
Community Building: Social media cultivates online communities based on shared interests, providing support, solidarity, and spaces for marginalised groups to voice their perspectives.
Business Opportunities: Platforms offer cost-effective avenues for businesses to reach and engage with their target audiences, facilitating marketing, networking, and customer relations.
Creative Expression: Social media provides a platform for individuals to showcase their creativity, talents, and innovations, encouraging artistic expression and fostering inspiration.
Negatives of social media
Constant ability to be contacted
Cyberbullying and Harassment: Social media platforms can become breeding grounds for cyberbullying, harassment, and trolling, impacting individuals' mental health and well-being.
Addictive Behavior: Excessive use of social media can lead to addiction, affecting productivity, sleep patterns, and real-life social interactions.
Misinformation and Fake News: The rapid spread of misinformation and fake news on social media platforms can lead to the dissemination of false information and the manipulation of public opinion.
Privacy Concerns: Social media raises significant privacy issues, with users' personal data often being collected, shared, or exploited without their consent.
Negative Impact on Mental Health: Continuous exposure to idealised images, comparison culture, and curated lifestyles on social media can contribute to feelings of inadequacy, anxiety, and low self-esteem among users.
#filtered
On the surface, adding a filter to a photo is just harmless fun. Turning into a dog or adding freckles are two of the hundreds of different filters available at any one time on Snapchat or Instagram. However, a lot of filters can give a false and negative view of body image. As teenagers are generally more impressionable, filtering what they see can distort their perception of body image. Because of this, we are also encouraging young people to judge immediately based on appearance.
Treatment
The majority of children’s mental health treatments are through CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services). Recent reports have shown that young people can wait anywhere between nine and twenty-two weeks for initial appointments.
On average, only 1% of the budget from CCG (Clinical Commissioning Groups) is spent on under-18 mental health services, therefore, meaning that long waits are seen, and sometimes children fall through the cracks completely. It is thought that around ¾’s of individuals have to wait so long for treatment that their conditioning ends up worsening. It may be then that the initial therapy they were waiting for is no longer sufficient.
However, the good news is that both funding and staffing in CAMHS are increasing steadily! Although this may not be in proportion to the increase in caseload, an increase in staffing should see this wait time decrease.
“Sometimes real superheroes live in the hearts of small children fighting big battles” For more information and myth-busting on children's mental health, follow us on Facebook and Instagram!
