Following the Covid era, kids are dealing with anxiety at alarming rates not seen before. This can be contributed to many factors, but there are a couple of primary ongoing culprits.
Here are 5 things that increase anxiety and aggression in kids.
Excessive Screen Time
Why do the CEO’s of major tech companies like Apple restrict their own kids from using or owning devices? Overexposure to screens in one of the biggest factors impacting the anxiety levels of children today. They are being raised in a phone-based childhood over a play-based childhood. Unfortunately, the full effects of this will not be seen until future generations. (Every parent should read this eye-opening book, The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness)
Lack of Sleep
Ask any teacher and they’ll be quick to tell you that children who have inconsistent bedtimes or no bedtimes at all are negatively impacted in their school success. Lack of sleep naturally makes children more irritable, emotionally reactive, and prone to anxiety and aggression in all areas of life.
Unhealthy Diet and Nutrition
Kids who have a consistently high sugar intake can’t help but be affected negatively. A diet largely build on processed foods, and sugary treats and drinks will naturally impact a child’s behaviors, moods, and emotional responses.
Exposure to Adult Anxiety and Aggression
Regular family conflict, trauma, and stressful situations can lead to inward insecurity/anxiety and outward aggression. The simple statement that “hurt people hurt people” is true for kids too. Kids are creatures of imitation, and will mirror what they see in us, both for good and for bad.
Ongoing Negativity In the Home
Parents regularly yelling at kids rather than calmly and consistently enforcing expectations… Criticism getting a megaphone while praise barely getting a whisper… Consistently highlighting faults over fostering forgiveness. Ongoing forms of negativity can cause our kids to disengage inwardly (anxiety) or misbehave outwardly (aggression).
While there could be so much more written on each of these, the takeaways are clear.
Which one of these hits closest to home that you can focus on improving in your family this week?
