Sujata Gupta in ScienceNews:
For years, researchers and policymakers have been sounding the alarm about the limited opportunities children and teenagers have to play and explore without adults around. For instance, children across much of the Western world are less likely to hold part-time jobs or walk or bike to school alone compared with previous generations, psychologist Peter Gray and colleagues noted in a September 2023 review in the Journal of Pediatrics. Other research shows that parents report increasing discomfort with letting their kids engage in risky, unsupervised play.
That loss of freedom coincides with a decades-long uptick in teen mental health problems. But showing that one causes the other has proven difficult because of all the other recent changes to childhood, such as technology use, researchers say. But it’s clear that squelching childhood independence undermines normal development, including a teenager’s innate need for close peers and intimate partners, says Gray, of Boston College. “It’s absolutely no surprise to me that we are seeing these dramatic rises in anxiety, depression, even suicide among teenagers.”
More here.
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