Exploring Mental Health Challenges During Adolescence
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The teenage years can be hard enough to manage without the additional challenges mental health conditions can present. Still, approximately 14% of the world’s teenagers experience mental health challenges daily; according to the World Health Organization, one in seven adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19 may experience a mental disorder. Leading causes of illness and disability among teens usually include depression, anxiety disorders, and behavioral disorders. There may be no single cause of mental illness, and it can affect anyone. For professional help with your teen’s mental health, consider working with a licensed therapist in person or online.
What is mental health?
According to the Centers for Disease Control, mental health can be seen as a generic term encompassing human social, emotional, and psychological well-being. A person’s mental health can affect how they think, feel, and act.
A mental health disorder can be defined as a psychological condition that alters a person's mood, behavior, thinking, or perception. It can interfere with their ability to function in one or more areas of their lives. Adolescents generally establish the patterns they use for emotional regulation, resilience, and coping during their teenage years. Untreated mental disorders can interfere with that development.
How does adolescent mental health affect mood and behavior?
- Mental health can alter how teens perceive themselves and others. It can impact their thoughts and ideas, including how they see the world and their place in it.
- Mental health disorders may cause your teen to lose interest in activities they used to enjoy.
- Your teen may start avoiding certain activities, places, or people.
- They might feel increasingly isolated, misunderstood, or outcast.
- Adverse reactions to mental health symptoms and stigmas, such as shame, for instance, may cause teens to hide their emotional problems rather than seek help.
Recognizing the warning signs of adolescent mental health concerns
Mental illness can look different from one disorder and individual to another. Still, there are some common warning signs psychologists recommend parents and guardians watch for in their adolescent children. These can indicate the need for mental health services:
- Anhedonia, the inability to experience pleasure, or a loss of interest in things they used to enjoy
- Persistently low energy levels
- Drastic changes in sleep patterns, including sleeping too much or too little
- Avoiding social contact with friends or family, or spending increasing amounts of time alone
- Intense fear of gaining weight; excessive diet or exercise
- Self-harming behavior, such as burning or cutting
- Using alcohol, tobacco, or recreational substances
- Engaging in risky or self-destructive behavior
- Cycles where they seem to have elevated energy and require much less sleep
- Delusional ideas and beliefs
- Hearing or seeing things others do not
- Feeling disconnected from themselves or reality in general
- Lingering feelings of worry, guilt, anxiety, stress, fear, sadness, worthlessness, hopelessness, or other emotions with adverse effects for two weeks or longer
- Trouble thinking or concentrating, leading to difficulty functioning at school, work, or in relationships
- Intrusive suicidal thoughts or behaviors
Common mental health disorders in adolescents
According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, most adolescents with a mental health condition experience either an anxiety disorder, mood disorder, behavioral disorder, or eating disorder.
Anxiety disorders (32% of adolescents 13-18)
Anxiety disorders, such as generalized anxiety disorder, tend to be the most common type of mental health disorder in adolescents. These disorders may involve overwhelming feelings of fear, worry, and uneasiness that can interfere with a person's ability to function in one or more areas of life.
Mood disorders (13% of adolescents 12-17)
Many teenagers experience mood disorders and related symptoms. Major depressive disorder and other mood disorders can affect how your teen thinks, feels, and functions day-to-day. As a result, it can significantly affect their overall health and wellness.
Behavioral disorders (9% of adolescents 13-18)
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is typically the most common behavioral disorder diagnosed in adolescence. This condition is often characterized by persistent trouble focusing or paying attention and impulsive behavior, with or without hyperactivity.
Eating disorders (3% of adolescents 13-18)
While developing their sense of identity, many teenagers experience problems with their self-image. They may experience an overwhelming desire to be seen as thin and attractive, for example. Eating disorders usually involve abnormal or extreme food-related behaviors. These can include excessive dieting or binge eating, for example.
Mental health risk factors in children and adolescents
In general, there are some risk factors to be aware of when considering your teen’s mental health:
- Genetics
- Neurochemical imbalance and physical brain differences
- Physical, emotional, and social changes
- Exposure to poverty, neglect, abuse*, violence, or trauma
- Lack of sleep or nutrition
- Under-developed sense of emotional intelligence, awareness, or literacy
- Inadequate support or protection from caregivers
- Media influence
- Gender, cultural, and societal norms
- Quality of family and peer relationships
- Social isolation
- Stigma, exclusion, or discrimination
- Comorbid physical, cognitive, neurological, or mental health disorders
How can parents support their adolescent’s mental health?
Consider these tips to support your child’s adolescent development and mental health.
Model and teach healthy emotional regulation
It may be helpful to remember that you are your child’s first role model. Consider letting them see you using healthy emotional regulation, coping, and management skills. You could also offer age-appropriate lessons to help them recognize and name their feelings, understand how they affect mood and behavior, and communicate their needs and emotions to others. A strong sense of emotional intelligence has been linked with good mental health.
Foster emotional resilience, communication, compromise, and conflict-resolution
Well-adjusted, emotionally healthy adults tend to learn many of their skills in childhood and master them during adolescence. Consider teaching your teenager to build their emotional resilience, so they can bounce back after facing challenges. Communication can alleviate many aspects of a problem—or solve it altogether. Teaching teenagers the importance of compromise can help them balance empathy, disappointment, and negotiation. Learning these healthy conflict resolution methods now can improve their chances of forging successful relationships in the future.
Provide children and adolescents with support and guidance
As your child matures, it may be beneficial to provide them with loving emotional support and guidance while giving them age-appropriate responsibility, boundaries, expectations, and consequences.
Practice and encourage daily self-care
Consider letting your teenager see you taking care of yourself. Encourage them to make self-care a part of their daily routine.
Mental health services for adolescents
Most mental health services involve psychotherapy (talk therapy), medication, or a combination of the two. It can be essential to remember that not every mental health professional can prescribe medication, and medication may not always be the most effective treatment option.
Potential treatment approaches utilized by adolescent mental health services
Depending on your teenager's diagnosable mental health disorder, one of the following treatment approaches may be used to help them manage the condition:
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Family Therapy
- Group Therapy
- Interpersonal Therapy (IPT)
- Mentalization-Based Therapy (MBT)
- Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)
- Play Therapy
- Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
- Psychoanalysis
- Supportive Therapy
Benefits of online therapy in coping with mental health challenges during adolescence
Parenting can be difficult, and parenting teenagers is often considered one of the most challenging tasks for a caregiver. While traditional therapy can provide support, it can be difficult for busy parents to make time for these in-office appointments. Consider working with a licensed therapist online through a teletherapy platform like BetterHelp for the support and guidance of a mental health professional without the commute. Treatment can teach you valuable parenting, communication, conflict resolution, and coping skills to help you safeguard your own mental health, relate to your child, and maintain healthy family dynamics.
Effectiveness of online therapy for youth mental health concerns
A growing body of evidence suggests that online and in-person therapy tend to produce the same client outcomes. Meanwhile, a 2023 meta-analysis investigating the efficacy of an online parenting intervention for parents of children and adolescents with mental health disorders found that “online parent programs have positive effects on reducing emotional symptoms in children and adolescents.”
Takeaway
Questions to ask your therapist about adolescent mental health
What are common mental health challenges during adolescence?
There are many different mental health challenges that adolescents may experience. Some examples include:
- Mood disorders (e.g., major depression, other depressive disorders, bipolar disorder)
- Anxiety disorders (e.g., social anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder)
- Behavioral disorders (e.g., substance use disorder (formerly substance abuse disorders), attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), conduct disorder)
- Trauma-related disorders (e.g., post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), adjustment disorder, effects of trauma related to bullying or sexual violence)
- Eating disorders (e.g., binge eating disorder, anorexia nervosa)
- Personality disorders (e.g., borderline personality disorder, paranoid personality disorder)
What youth mental health services are available?
There are various mental health services available to help young adults, high school students, and college students with general mental health and signs of specific psychiatric disorders. Some high schools and many colleges offer free or discounted services of this kind for students. There are also community mental health clinics as well as in-person and online therapists.
How can I help my teen cope with anxiety?
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, there are various resources available to help parents help their children cope with mood and anxiety disorders and other mental health challenges in young adulthood. It may also help to be compassionate, listen actively without judgment, create supportive environments for them, encourage them to build healthy habits that may help reduce anxiety (like eating nutritious foods and exercising), and help them find a therapist, support group, anxiety workbook, or other resources for positive mental health. For diagnosable disorders, a healthcare provider may recommend therapy, lifestyle changes, and, in some cases, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) or other medications.
What are the mental health challenges that can emerge in adolescence?
According to the Office of Population Affairs’ webpage on adolescents’ mental health, almost 50% of young people have experienced a diagnosable mental disorder at some point in their life. They report that some of the most common psychiatric disorders that may affect teen mental health include depression, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and eating disorders. Many anxiety disorders are also common among this population.
Some common warning signs of poor mental health in teens can include:
- Depressed mood
- Physical symptoms like significant changes in appetite or sleeping patterns
- Other somatic symptoms like headaches, stomachaches, or sweating
- Anxiety symptoms like constant worry
- Obsessive thoughts about food, eating, and/or body weight
- Substance misuse (formerly “substance abuse”)
- Suicidal ideation
Those with a family history of certain disorders may also want to look out for symptoms of those illnesses in their child’s health, as early identification may improve long-term outcomes.
What are some examples of mental health challenges?
Mental health challenges can take many forms. They can range from nonclinical but disruptive situations like low self-esteem and relationship challenges to diagnosable conditions listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, like depression or an anxiety disorder.
What are the challenges in mental development of late adolescence?
Experts in the field of adolescent medicine note many potential challenges related to mental health and development that a young person may face in their teen years and early adulthood. Physical, social, and intellectual changes are common, as are significant adjustments in life circumstances.
Young people in this stage are also often working to figure out who they are, whether that be related to gender identity, sexual orientation, career goals, or core values. These many changes and challenges make adolescent patients particularly prone to mental health concerns, from depression to alcohol misuse (formerly “alcohol abuse”) to disordered eating to low self-esteem.
How is mental health affected by puberty?
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, “Fear, uncertainty and lack of control” tend to be heightened during times of significant change, “And puberty is a time of massive change: hormonal, physical, sexual, social, cognitive and neurological.” Without proper support and healthy coping strategies, the tumult of this time can lead to mental health challenges in adolescents—particularly in those who are also experiencing physical health challenges or changes, like pregnant adolescents or chronically ill teens.
What are the mental changes during adolescence?
There are many different mental changes a young person may experience during this phase of life. For example, they may begin questioning and conceptualizing their own identity, values, and goals, learning to form relationships, and finding ways to cope with stress. You can find more information on mental health challenges during adolescence from sources like Arch Gen Psychiatry, the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and the World Health Organization.
What are the five difficulties you face during adolescence?
Five common difficulties during adolescence include self-esteem challenges, relationship challenges, mental health challenges, challenges related to future life goals, and family challenges. That said, each individual’s experience may vary.
What are the characteristics of a mentally healthy adolescent?
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, mentally healthy adolescents have at least one friend, at least one adult to talk to, and one positive hobby or pastime that engages them. They’re happy at least some of the time and do not engage in self-harm or have self-destructive behavioral risks. These apply to male adolescents and adolescents of any gender identity.
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