mental health problems

Study: Social media and general tech engagement not found to “fry” teenagers’ brains

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Lit­tle to no increase in asso­ci­a­tion between ado­les­cents’ men­tal health prob­lems and dig­i­tal tech (Sci­ence Daily):

With the explo­sion in dig­i­tal enter­tain­ment options over the past sev­er­al decades and the more recent restric­tions on out­door and in-per­son social activ­i­ties, par­ents may wor­ry that exces­sive engage­ment with dig­i­tal tech­nol­o­gy could have long-term effects on their chil­dren’s men­tal health.

A new study pub­lished in the jour­nal Clin­i­cal Psy­cho­log­i­cal Sci­ence, how­ev­er, found lit­tle evi­dence for an increased asso­ci­a­tion between ado­les­cents’ tech­nol­o­gy engage­ment and men­tal health prob­lems over the past 30 years. The data did not con­sis­tent­ly sup­port the sug­ges­tion that the tech­nolo­gies we wor­ry about most (e.g., smart­phones) are becom­ing more harm­ful… [Read more…] about Study: Social media and gen­er­al tech engage­ment not found to “fry” teenagers’ brains

Debate: Can mindfulness and meditation be harmful?

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Yes (in per­haps 8% of indi­vid­u­als). Can mind­ful­ness and med­i­ta­tion be harm­ful? (Sci­ence Focus):

Med­i­ta­tion has escaped both the reli­gious cells of monks and nuns and the labs of sci­en­tists. An increas­ing num­ber of peo­ple are using med­i­ta­tion apps to deal with men­tal health prob­lems, such as depres­sion and anx­i­ety. Although there is no clear esti­mate of how many peo­ple are prac­tis­ing med­i­ta­tion, last year one sin­gle app had close to 40 mil­lion down­loads. [Read more…] about Debate: Can mind­ful­ness and med­i­ta­tion be harmful?

Large study with twins highlights the limited role of genetics in mental health and the importance of effective early interventions for ADHD

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Mul­ti­ple stud­ies have indi­cat­ed that, on aver­age, youth with ADHD have poor­er out­comes in young adult­hood in mul­ti­ple areas com­pared to their unaf­fect­ed peers.

A lim­i­ta­tion of these stud­ies, how­ev­er, is that they have not typ­i­cal­ly dis­tin­guished between indi­vid­u­als whose ADHD per­sists into adult­hood from those where the con­di­tion remits. [Read more…] about Large study with twins high­lights the lim­it­ed role of genet­ics in men­tal health and the impor­tance of effec­tive ear­ly inter­ven­tions for ADHD