America the Sick and Anxious

And so too are our kids

BILL ASTORE

NOV 25, 2025

“America’s children are unwell.” From the New York Times this morning:

Nearly one in four 17-year-old boys in the United States has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. In the early 1980s, a diagnosis of autism was delivered to one child in 2,500. That figure is now one in 31. Almost 32 percent of adolescents have at some point been given a diagnosis of anxiety. More than one in 10 have experienced a major depressive disorder, my colleague Jia Lynn Yang reports.

And the number of mental health conditions is expanding. A child might be tagged with oppositional defiance disorder or pathological avoidance disorder. “The track has become narrower and narrower, so a greater range of people don’t fit that track anymore,” an academic who studies children and education told Jia Lynn. “And the result is, we want to call it a disorder.”

Why did this happen? A lot of reasons. Kids spend hours on screens, cutting into their sleep, exercise and socializing — activities that can ward off anxiety and depression. Mental health screenings have improved.

And then there’s school itself: a cause of stress for many children and the very place that sends them toward a diagnosis.

I can’t read the main article since it’s behind a paywall. The gist of the article is that American schooling is hyper competitive, constricting, perhaps too demanding, and therefore a big part of the problem.

Maybe. Schools are also chronically underfunded. Teaching remains an underpaid profession. Classrooms can be overcrowded. Standards vary widely. And parents are stressed as they try to get their kids into the “right” schools. It’s not hard to see how that educational ecosystem might amplify distress.

But the explosion in ADHD diagnoses, autism, and anxiety is surely also driven by Big Pharma.* “We’ve got a drug for that” should be the motto of these companies. Americans are bombarded every day with drug ads promising to change our lives. I’m not a parent myself, but if my kid had trouble focusing or otherwise had behavioral issues, I’d explore medication as an option. I’m guessing it’s easier to get a prescription for Adderall or Ritalin than for kids to get wise treatment and sustained counseling from a psychiatrist or other mental health specialist.

Some parents may even feel that particular diagnoses confer a kind of status— confirmation that their child is not merely struggling but exceptional in some “high-functioning” or creatively gifted way. That, too, reflects broader cultural forces.(“Annie is autistic and really too intelligent/creative/artistic/sensitive for this world.”)

But beyond parental dysfunction, omnipresent screens, school pressures, and pharmaceutical marketing, there’s a deeper question: Are our kids simply mirroring the broader dysfunction of American society? We live in a culture marked by relentless competition, materialism, polarization, and chronic stress. There’s little about our adult world that could be described as calm or balanced. If our society itself is unwell, why would we expect our kids to feel—or behave—otherwise?

I know it’s not easy, but surely kids need to unplug more (especially from social media, with all its pressures). They need to get outside more. They need to play more—they need more unstructured time. They probably need less stimulation—and arguably more time to be, in a word, bored. To find their own way to play, their own hobbies and interests to pursue, their own path in life.

A dysfunctional society produces dysfunctional kids. If that’s true, how do we make a society that better serves everyone? If American society and culture is uniquely disorienting and destabilizing, can’t we change that? Can’t we make a better saner world for our kids?

Grim factoid: In 2008, Americans consumed 80% of the world’s opioid supply. Though that percentage has dropped to roughly 40% today, what is it about American life that is so painful? Why are we so addicted to (legal and illegal) drugs? And now our kids too?

Readers, what do you make of all this?

*By no means am I dismissing mental illness; my brother Stevie had his first schizophrenic episode when he was sixteen in 1973 and never fully recovered from it. I have friends with a daughter with severe Asperger’s syndrome. My concern here is the vast increase in ADHD, autism, and similar diagnoses and the potential reasons for this.