A report from Harvard Graduate School of Education shows a strong connection between parent and adolescent mental health and offers prevention strategies for teen anxiety and depression: The Critical Link Between Parent and Teen Mental Health
The medical community declared a national emergency in child and adolescent mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now a new report shines a light on another important aspect of the story — the influence that mental health challenges faced by parents and primary caregivers have on teens.
“It’s a fundamental tenet of psychology that children don’t grow up in isolation,” explains Richard Weissbourd, the study’s lead author and faculty director of the Making Caring Common Project at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. “They grow up embedded in families, embedded in communities — and to understand the experience of teens, it’s really important to understand their context.”
Caring for the Caregivers: The Critical Link Between Parent and Teen Mental Health is the first of three reports investigating potential causes and prevention strategies for teens and young adults suffering from mental illness in the United States.
Five key findings are described in the article. One highlighted is that data collected from two nationally representative surveys – one with teens and young adults and another with parents/caregivers – reveal parental anxiety and depression rates are similar to those experienced by teens.
Weissbourd and other researchers give suggestions about how to help teens’ mental health and how parents can also help teens.
The article’s headings include:
- It takes a village – caring for caregivers
- Five strategies to support parents and help them to prevent anxiety and depression in teens
Additional resources are linked in the article:
- Caring for the Caregivers: The Critical Link Between Parent and Teen Mental Health
- The Protective Powers of Out-of-School Play
- Children’s Mental Health
- Protecting Youth Mental Health
- Declaration of a National Emergency in Child and Adolescent Mental Health