Jonathan Haidt on “Why Teen Mental Health Collapsed in so Many Countries at the Same Time, and What we can Do About It.”

How the great rewiring of childhood is causing an epidemic of mental illness. In this talk, Dr. Jonathan Haidt will summarize his argument in his recent book, The Anxious Generation, about how the rapid shift from a play-based childhood to a phone-based childhood has blocked child and adolescent development in many domains. The harms to mental health have been widely discussed and debated. Dr. Haidt presents new evidence that the relationship of smartphones and social media to poor mental health is not just correlational, it is causal. He hopes to discuss with the group how the medical community can play a larger role in what (he claims) is among the biggest public health threats we currently face.