ANXIOUS TEENS; BLOG # 2097; AUG 11, 2017

THE MESSAGE:

Some people ask; "Why is it that girls tend to be more anxious than boys?"

 

Parents are  concerned about the 15 yr old son who is not working hard at school and his grades are sliding. He spends most of his free time playing video games or surfing the Web for girls. The son, however, is enjoying himself immensely. 

Turn the page to a 14-year-old daughter. She is a straight-A student, a good athlete and has many friends. However, she feels uncomfortable if she gives in to eating  'junk food' during the day. She often has shortness of breath and panic attacks at night. On the surface her life appears to be ideal but she is falling apart on the inside.

THE BLURB:

• Appearance: some research has shown that in adolescence, girls tend to become more dissatisfied with their bodies, whereas boys tend to become more satisfied with their bodies. A girl is much more likely than a boy to post a photo of herself wearing a swimsuit, while the boy is more likely to post a photo relating to something he has done rather than on how he looks. If you don’t like the boy's trophy picture as team captain, no big deal. But if you don’t like the girl's photo of herself in the bikini, she’s more likely to take it personally.

• Consider the girl sitting in her bedroom at her computer scrolling through other girls’ internet feeds. She sees one showing off her new bikini and looking hot. She sees another at a party, surrounded by friends and having a blast. She sees another hugging her adorable new puppy and looking like a true friend. She thinks: I’m just sitting here alone, not doing anything. My life sucks! 

Boys are at lower risk for the toxic effects of social media than girls are, for at least three reasons. 

• Boys are less likely to care a great deal about people's opinions on their selfies. “Does this swimsuit make me look fat?” is a question asked by girls more often than by boys.

• Boys tend to overestimate how interesting their own life is.
  

• Boys are likely to spend more time playing video games than Photoshopping a selfie for Instagram. Remember, in video games, unlike social media, everybody eventually gets to be a winner if he just perseveres.
  

The Parental Role as prescribed by the American Academy of Paediatrics.

If your daughter is the girl sitting in her bedroom looking at other girls’ social media, maybe she shouldn’t be in her bedroom at all. A family can’t be a family if the kids spend more time alone in their bedrooms than with their family members. Insist that your daughter, or son, do whatever they’re doing online in the kitchen or the living room where they can be monitored. There should be no screens in the bedroom.

Supper time is family time! Don’t allow phones at the table. In  2013, a Canadian survey of kids, across a range of backgrounds, found that those who had more meals with parents were much less likely to  feel sad, anxious or lonely. They were more likely to help others and more likely to report being satisfied with their own lives. 

But be mindful of what you say at the table. Discussions of poor grades, disappointing test scores or mistakes made in yesterday's minor hockey game are out of bounds. The Palestinian-Israeli conflict? Of course. The origin of the universe and the meaning of life? Certainly. But the personal shortcomings of your child are, as a rule, not appropriate suppertime conversation in a loving family.

A crucial part of parenting is to prioritize the family, to give your child a secure grounding in a loving home.

The World Health Organization.

The 2013 and 2014 report on adolescent health and happiness was based on surveys of more than 200,000 young people in 42 countries in Europe and North America. “Technology is unquestionably a positive presence in all our lives, but we must remain vigilant to the threats it poses to children and young people,” Jo Inchley and Dorothy Currie, two executives who helped coordinate the study, wrote in its preface.

According to a report from this group, Belgian and Polish adolescents are among the least happy in Europe. More than half the teenagers in Greenland smoke. Overall, the report found, 15-year-old girls were perhaps the worst off of any group surveyed.

In one section titled “Growing Up Unequal,” the report found that 15-year-old Polish, British and French girls were among those expressing the least satisfaction with their lives. They were the most likely to report a decline in their well-being, and on average, one in five reported poor or fair health. They also displayed an increased dissatisfaction with their bodies. The report noted that, particularly in western and central European countries, this dissatisfaction prevailed despite the fact that actual levels of overweight and obesity remained stable.

Boys were more likely than girls to have had sexual intercourse in about half the countries and regions surveyed, particularly in Eastern Europe. Forty percent of male 15-year-olds surveyed in Bulgaria said they had had sex, compared with 21 percent of female Bulgarians of the same age. The numbers were even more skewed in Albania, where 39 percent of boys there said that they had had sex, while 2 percent of girls the same age reported such behavior. Over all, 21 percent of the 15-year-olds surveyed reported having sex.

The report concluded that policy makers must strive to recognize girls’ unhappiness and find structural solutions, and called for efforts to address the “clear gender-difference issue.”

THE QUESTION:

How reliable and accurate are self-report surveys?

THE LEMON:

Awarded to cyber bullies and deadbeat dads everywhere!

THE QUOTE:

"I spent the first fourteen years of my life convinced that my looks were hideous. Adolescence is painful for everyone, I know, but mine was plain weird." Uma Thurman

THE CLIP: