In The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt lays out the facts about the epidemic of teen mental illness that hit many countries at the same time. He then investigates the nature of childhood, including why children need play and independent exploration to mature into competent, thriving adults. Haidt shows how the “play-based childhood” began to decline in the 1980s, and how it was finally wiped out by the arrival of the “phone-based childhood” in the early 2010s. He presents more than a dozen mechanisms by which this “great rewiring of childhood” has interfered with children’s social and neurological development, covering everything from sleep deprivation to attention fragmentation, addiction, loneliness, social contagion, social comparison, and perfectionism. He explains why social media damages girls more than boys and why boys have been withdrawing from the real world into the virtual world, with disastrous consequences for themselves, their families, and their societies.

I need to admit here that I had some high expectations for this book, which it didn’t quiet live up to. But of course I will explain everything in this review. So if you are interested in hearing my thoughts about this book then by all means, keep reading this review my dear reader.

This book gives us a lot of good points about how and why the Gen Z (my generation since am a 2002 baby) and later generations are (or seem at least) to be more anxious or depressed than other previous generations.

I personally didn’t agree with some of the points which the author of this book makes in this book. Some of the points I didn’t agree with which are made in this book are that Social Media and Video Games are the only cause behind anxiety, panic attacks and depression. It all depends on the person and what they actually interact with when it comes to social media. But I might not be the best person to comment on that aspect because I almost never use social media. My social media usage is probably like 2 or 3 hours a week solely because I have no interested in watching Tik Toks and selfies people post on instagram. But again blaming everything (anxiety, panic attacks, depression and other metal health issues) only on social media and video games felt to me like saying “the cause of getting cancer is bad genetics from your parents”.

But this book does make some very good points about the current education system in USA, Canada and the majority of Europe. I personally finished high school in 2021 and I personally were very bad in school because I had hard time concentrating on the classes. And out PE classes where the last class we would have on Friday each week so its safe to say that the PE didn’t help me there during high school. 

At the same time this book is aimed more towards parents, because this book provides a fair share of advice and recommendations aimed towards parents with teenagers and younger children. 

This book provides us with some statements from parents who’s kids are having anxiety and metal issues because of video games and social media. Which are a good way to explaining the theory the author has, but at the same time its like the author of this book makes very hard to believe him because in a way he tries to force us to believe that social media and video games are the cause of all evil in the world.

However this book wasn’t all bad, because throughout this book the author makes some good points. But those points are pretty rare in this book. And I need to admit that this book has to be the weakest psychology book I have read so far in my life. And it is for sure not worth the money and time you will spend on it because there are far better psychology books available. 

I Give This Book 3 / 5