Anxious Generation (Haidt - hardcover)

Author: Jonathan Haidt

ISBN: 9780593655030

Binding: hardcover

Section: Philosophy/Rhetoric/Logic

In The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt (pronounced "height") lays out the facts about the epidemic of teen mental illness that hit many countries at the same time. Haidt shows how the “play-based childhood” began to decline in the 1980s, and how it was finally wiped out by the arrival of the “phone-based childhood” in the early 2010s. He explains why social media damages girls more than boys and why boys have been withdrawing from the real world into the virtual world, with disastrous consequences for themselves, their families, and their societies. Most important, Haidt issues a clear call to action. He diagnoses the “collective action problems” that trap us, and then proposes four simple rules that might set us free. He describes steps that parents, teachers, schools, tech companies, and governments can take to end the epidemic of mental illness and restore a more humane childhood.