Or finds that more young adults are feeling anxious
and depressed at twice the rate of teens.
So this morning we have our nine news parenting expert,
Doctor Cheryl Ziegler joining us now.
Good morning, Doctor Ziegler. We just saw a little preview of your face right there.
Yeah, you did
on the show showed up a little bit earlier. Yeah,
thanks for being with us. This is important. We appreciate it.
So what are the findings in the report?
Yeah. So, you know, they're really, they're, they're not great.
Um What happened was it was a great idea in terms they
did a national sample and they looked at young adults and teens
and what they found was that even though teens do still have
very high levels of depression and anxiety and hopelessness that young adults.
So that's 18 to 24. They had double the rate where over half were like
uh uh in some measures, 56% of,
of the respondents said they were feeling hopeless
about the future and they're in the thirties,
about 36% saying that they experienced depression or anxiety over the last year.
So this is highly alarming are we talking about young adults as a whole.
Are there any specific groups that
might experience something? A little bit more?
Yeah. Unfortunately, like it tends to be um group that are disadvantaged.
Um Black and brown communities as well as lower socio economic status.
Um They seem to fare even more poorly.
Um A again, probably because of access to mental health resources.
And so we really though this is a,
is still a broad sample and I want people to understand
that we are talking about college age students who are new,
newly graduated high school, um students who are going into the world,
who are really feeling very down about the climate, about wars,
about just their community.
And they're not looking to the older people before them for solutions.
I think this is so interesting because when
you think about rates for depression and anxiety,
I think teens and come to mind,
this is just showing a different trend. Absolutely.
And what what is concerning for me, this was like a Gen Z study, but
Gen Z goes all the way down to like 10 years, you know, 10 years old.
So this is the generation.
So what I'm worried about is I'm worried about them
and then I'm worried that the generation as a whole,
if we don't change things pretty dramatically,
they're gonna trend in the same kind of direction.
Um This is
at this rate,
this is not sustainable to have a society at large that when
we're talking of one in three people um having depression or anxiety,
we're at about in general, one in 51 in three.
That's, that's not um a way to build things that's not a way to health.
And so it's, it's really a concerning study, you know, Gen Z though, they're,
they're a generation of very smart, intelligent young people.
Um And, and they're aware of therapy and other mental health resources.
You, you know, more so than
uh Gen Xers, let's say, for example,
where do we begin to help them out if
they're already aware of some of these resources and,
and it seems that they're still struggling.
Yeah, I it was interesting the first,
the first thing and I alluded to it before is they,
I think have got to get with each other.
They again,
don't look to whether it's politicians or people who are just older than them
really being able to help them.
They just see us as kind of ruining the world and they have to,
they have to come up solutions.
So I think gathering with people their own age
um getting involved around solution focused.
So, so opposed to problem focused, really solution focused. Um
Parents also need to stop being so overly involved.
And I, I've said this a million times on here.
But if we don't, if we keep doing for our kids,
then our kids become young adults and they can't do for themselves.
And that's a really big one for parents.
You know, it's funny,
I was just talking to my mom about this the other day because she, I had to kind of,
you know, set a boundary with her as well
and she said, you know,
I think I did so much for my kids because I didn't have parents who did a lot for me.
And so that just, you kind of wanna correct it for the next generation.
And unfortunately it seems like maybe we've overcorrected a little bit.
Exactly the over correction and it's not just
like my opinion about parenting or something.
Right. Like, oh, that's not good.
It really is actually what the data shows,
the data shows that kids really need to become competent.
They need to be not independent.
Like, go do it on your own, just competent.
We can be there to support them to come up with their own solutions.
And there really is a distinction there.
Yeah.
I mean, doing, you know,
you're trying to help but in the end you're doing more harm than good
and thinking about your two young kids at home
and it's hard, it's hard as a parent. Right.
To kind of, like, let them fall, you know, try to let them fly,
you're there to back them up or sometimes you go,
I'll just do it myself because it's faster and easier.
Right. And that seems little like when they're five
and you're, oh, let me tie your shoe laces. I could just do this fast. We gotta go.
But all of those things really add up. We need to have the patients to go.
Oh, it didn't work the first time.
It's ok. Try again.
Right. And that's, it's so subtle.
But, um,
we have now this 18 to 24 year olds to look at this is
what the outcome is if we don't make some corrections and changes now.
Well, that's incredibly enlightening. We appreciate you being here, Doctor Z.
Thank you for that.