The Dramatic Rise of Anxiety and Depression in Children and Adolescents: Is It Connected to the Decline in Play and Rise in Schooling?
This is really interesting. The author's hypothesis that 'play' is a source of confidence over control of one's life is a pretty cool idea, although I'm still not sure that 'play' has declined in a way that explains the rise in anxiety and depression. A professor once made a remark in his lecture about how knowledge doesn't bring happiness; "look at the grad students around you, they're the most miserable people there are!" It makes some sense though: knowing very well that smoking can give you cancer, or exactly what myriad of health problems can arise from being overweight, or even knowing exactly how likely you are to contract any particular variety of deadly disease in your life and exactly what your odds are-- why wouldn't you feel less like you have complete control over your life? Maybe we know too much as a society to be as happy as we used to be.