|
(Values and Visions: Western Culture and Humanity's Future, Address by Richard Eckersley) Recent evidence Increase in depression: There is growing evidence of a dramatic rise in major depressive illness in the US and other industrial nations, especially since the Second World War and especially among the young. Some of this evidence suggests a tenfold increase in depression among young people over this period. A recent major survey of the health of more than 2700 children aged 4-16 in Western Australia found 18% had mental health problems (including depression; delinquency; thought, attention and social problems; and aggressive behaviour). The proportions were 16% among those 4-11 and 21% among those 12-16. Youth suicide: Suicide has been called the mortality of depressive illness. Rates among young males have risen in most western nations since the 1950s, with some countries, including the US, Australia and New Zealand, experiencing a tripling or more. Rates are low (although probably under-reported) and appear to have increased little if at all in countries such as Italy and Spain, where family and religious ties remain strong. And in Japan, where adolescence is regarded as a rigorous apprenticeship and the emphasis is on integration into society, rates have fallen dramatically to amongst the lowest in the industrial world. Surveys also reveal a staggering level of suicidal ideation and attempts among young people, suggesting that suicide, or at least its contemplation, has become a mainstream option for today's young adults. University students
survey: a study just published of suicidal ideation (or thoughts)
and attempts among a sample of more than 1600 Queensland university
undergraduates, average age just under 22), found that almost two thirds
showed varying degrees of ideation in the previous year.
No suicidal ideation - 39% Minimal ideation
- 21% High ideation
- 19% Suicide-related
behaviour - 15% Suicide attempt
- 7%
What is going on here? Are the researchers being conned? Do the kids think they are being cool - but aren't really being serious - when they admit to such dark thoughts of death? Or are we making some awful, awful blunder that is stripping from so many of them the deep conviction that life is worthwhile and worth living. In the American writer Cormac McCarthy's acclaimed novel, All the pretty horses, the hero rides early one morning into a small Mexican town, where a group of laughing girls are festooning a gazebo with crepe. He stops at a cafe and after serving him the proprietor stands at the window watching the girls and says that it is good that God keeps the truths of life from the young as they are starting out, or else they'd have no heart to start at all. David Elkind, an American professor of child development and the author of the The hurried child, echoes this sentiment, saying there is this new image of children as competent and sophisticated. Like adults, they are expected to be able to handle all the issues they are exposed to. "But I disagree," he says, "I think children find it most disturbing, hurtful and damaging." The project comprised a series of eight workshops involving about 150 young people, most aged between 15 and 24 and from a variety of backgrounds, and a national telephone poll of 800 young Australians in this age group. The Partnership is part of ASTEC's major Future Needs 2010 foresight study. It was undertaken by a group of youth, education and science organisations. The project's aims were to explore young people's views of probable and preferred futures for Australia in 2010; and the key issues shaping these futures, including the role of science and technology.
The workshops suggest
most young people see the future mainly in terms of a worsening of today's
global and national problems and difficulties, although they also expect
some improvements. Major concerns included: pollution and environmental
destruction, including the impact of growing populations; the gulf between
rich and poor; high unemployment, including the effect of automation
and immigration; conflict, crime and violence; family problems and breakdown;
discrimination and prejudice; and economic difficulties, including the
level of foreign debt. The poll suggests optimism about the future is
more common than the workshops indicated. Nevertheless, the expectation
that the future will be better than the present remains a minority position: Many other surveys
have revealed this pessimism among young people (and older Australians,
too). In summarising this work, a recent Schools Council report also
links it to the systemic failure I have discussed: Young people's preferred future is not only very different from what they expect, but also from what they are promised under current priorities. Their preference - with its emphasis on the environment, community and family, and equality - also suggests the need for profound and systemic change. For example, asked in the poll which of two scenarios for Australia for 2010 came closer to the type of society they both expected and preferred, a majority said they expected "a fast-paced, internationally competitive society, with the emphasis on the individual, wealth generation and enjoying the 'good life'". However, a greater majority said they preferred " a 'greener', more stable society, where the emphasis is on cooperation, community and family, more equal distribution of wealth, and greater economic self-sufficiency".
© 1989-1999 to Dr Michael Ellis (Values and Visions: Western Culture and Humanity's Future, Address by Richard Eckersley)
|
