Increasing Levels of Emotional Impairment: Their Causes

Readers will have read about upward trends concerning depression, dysphoria, and anxiety among teenagers in the United States during the first two decades of the twenty-first century.

Special education teachers report that “emotionally impaired” (EI) students are an increasing percentage of their caseloads. Psychiatric medication and inpatient stays for mental health reasons are common.

Any exploration of the causes behind this trend will be complex and multifactorial.

Unlike learning disabilities (e.g., dyslexia), or developmental conditions (e.g., ASD), emotional impairment is significantly shaped by environmental factors.

To be sure, learning disabilities and developmental conditions are affected by environmental factors to some extent, and one should not overstate the impact of environmental factors on emotional impairment.

One way, among others, in which the social environment shapes emotional impairment is in the failure of micro-environment (nuclear family) or of the macro-environment (the larger community) to provide clear life paths and social roles for the individual.

The failure of society to provide these shaping forces is, by itself, not a cause of EI, but rather can be an occasion upon which EI will manifest itself in an individual who has other factors which predispose for EI.

Faced with a social existence in which expectations are unclear, absent, or only weakly reinforced, a latent EI may manifest itself. Developmentally, teenagers are asking about what they will be and what they will do.

If society fails to provide norms and standards for individual identities and life choices, then the individual is forced to rely more on internal personal strengths. If those strengths are lacking, or are misinformed, EI may emerge.

The rise in EI is coextensive with, and correlates to, a decline in clearly articulated social roles and expectations provided to the individual in the form of a normative life trajectory. As is well-known, however, correlation does not necessarily indicate causation.

Social norms are provided in the forms of propositional assertion about roles, norms, and life trajectory. But norms are also communicated by examples. Teenagers observe adults.

Individual stability is undermined, then, both by society’s failure to clearly state its norms and roles, and by adults who fail to function as examples. In such an environment, then, EI is more likely to emerge.

Accelerated Academic Trajectories: Too Much, Too Soon?

In the last decade or two, innovations have been introduced into the American educational landscape which allow high school students to earn college credit hours before matriculating at a university: dual enrollment has been made easier because colleges and universities have launched their own charter schools.

Even before these developments, there were other dual enrollment options, and credits given from Advanced Placement (AP) exams. The AP program dates back to the 1950s.

But the number, variety, and availability of these opportunities has increased significantly in recent years. Another option is credit hours earned by taking International Baccalaureate (IB) exams.

The result can be understood by a concrete example. A student who attended a charter school operated by a local community college was able to graduate, at age 18, with enough college credits so that she started at a local university the three months later as junior. After only two years at that university, she graduated with what is normally a ‘four-year’ degree.

The acceleration continued when she found a ‘twelve-month’ graduate program: a Master’s Degree which normally requires two full academic years can be earn in one calendar year.

At age 21, then, she entered the workforce with her newly-minted Master’s Degree. Under the traditional system, such a degree isn’t earned until age 24.

Parents in such cases are both proud of their child’s academic savvy and happy with the tuition dollars saved. But is there a downside to these types of programs?

Although the student avoided three years of time and tuition dollars, there is a question about life learning. Education can be accelerated; experience can’t.

Assuming that the education is the same, what’s the difference between a 21-year-old and 24-year-old? Ceterus paribus, three year’s worth of reality.

In professions related to healthcare, or in negotiating contracts, the three extra years of living might be an asset important to potential employers.

To be sure, there remains the question of student debt and three years’ worth of tuition. But there may be creative solutions.

A few semesters at a local community college can be had for a fraction of the cost of time spent at major universities. For the student who’s at risk for graduating too early, this might be a solution.

Another option would be part-time student status combined with a part-time job. This arrangement would provide some income to offset the extra years of tuition.

In any case, it’s worth considering that education is not simply a race to the diploma or a race to the job market. Maturation can’t be arbitrarily accelerated.

Physical Fitness: Possibly the New Sport?

There is little need to convince any reasonably well-read citizen that physical exercise is important for young people. We all know that students in both elementary and secondary schools should engage in some type of movement on a regular basis, preferable outdoors.

But there is reason to challenge the common assumption that being part of a high school athletic program is good way to get exercise.

Being part of a team often, although not always, ensures some amount of physical fitness. The delivery of that benefit can, however, be enormously inefficient.

A student may spend several hours a day in, e.g., a football or basketball practice. But that does not mean that he’s spending several hours in strenuous physical exercise.

In such teams, players might sit for a long time on bleachers, listening to the coach talk about strategy and tactics. They spend time standing line, waiting for their turn at various drills or relay activities.

During practices, players receive instructions from athletic trainers or physical therapists about injury prevention, and they spend time organizing fundraisers. They may have to wait to use various pieces of exercise equipment.

A three- or four-hour practice does not, therefore, mean that a student had three or four hours of physical exercise.

By contrast, a merely 20 to 30 minutes of running, swimming, or bicycling is a much more time-efficient way to deliver physical fitness. Likewise, a similar amount of time spent in calisthenics is an effective program to obtain a significant amount of exercise in short period of time.

Perhaps the time has come, in the culture of American secondary schools, to place more emphasis on physical fitness and less emphasis on organized team sports.