To think there needs to be a public inquiry into child development

Parents used to talk to their children from young age much more in the past than now from what I can see.
Nowadays I see people pushing a pram and talking on their phone rather than talking to the child and capturing their interest.
I see parents out eating with their very young children, giving them an iPad to play with rather than engage in a conversation with them .
These are opportunities when children have to hear, digest what is said and respond. This impacts on their listening and communication skills.

I absolutely* *agree with this, however people in general seem to be becoming less tolerable of children out in public, so a lot of parents use devices to keep their children quiet. Plus, God forbid you interact with your children too enthusiastically in public people accuse you of performance parenting.

Imo society is on a downward spiral in so many areas.

Covid has a lot to answer for but also I think a lot of young people lack resilience presumably due to upbringing. I’m on a kids going to university group on FB and the amount of kids having panic attacks in exams is surprising. I’ve sat countless exams and never known one person have a panic attack in one. Obviously i think it’s right that people with MH problems get appropriate support but it seems so prevalent now, not even talking people with diagnosed illness but that can’t cope with the curve balls life throws at them. That said i know lots of young people who are also great so hopefully as a society we’ll be OK, we’ve always had wasters after all.

No, not everybody is autistic.

A diagnosis is useful for knowing yourself if you're at later age and to be able to devise strategies to help.

Besides, we all know anybody who self diagnoses gets absolutely slaughtered on SM for doing so - to then question why they would be assessed, means people can't really win!

Anyway to avoid completely derailing this thread, I would say to OP that a true thorough investigation needs to not just look at the past decade of parenting, but at least the past 30 years. Plenty of parental blame to go around, not just for the modern era.

Yes - I think so, it takes a village…we dont seem to have the communities we had even 20 years ago.

Permanent expulsions from state schooling (and imprisonment in criminal cases) need to return. It breaks my heart that Brianna Ghey was murdered by an utterly evil, criminal child because the original school couldn’t be bothered to contact the police (or tell the new school) when she roofied a girl.

I also believe, from what I’ve seen outside of London, is that the problem here is (mainly) white british parents don’t tend to enforce boundaries or parent their children (or even potty train) before they start school. And that sets them behind for life.

I would say everyone is on the spectrum if they actually read up on it but unless it's significantly impacting your life why would you. This is the reason wait lists are so long. Anyone who has ever watched tiktoks talking about signs you may have adhd/ add/ asd ect it's literally describes everyone.

Are lots of children delayed, aggressive and disruptive today? and if so, is it because they are badly parented or because the expectations on small children in schools today are unrealistic?
Your teacher when you started school at the age of five in 1980 was essentially a nursery nurse. Your early years foundation stage teacher when you start school today at the age of four, is a degree educated professional.
LOL at the idea that kids in the 60s 70s 80s etc were better parented than today. Lots of 20th century kids in the UK were largely free range at weekends/holidays/after school from the age of approximately 5 and up.
Oh and I know this will fall on deaf ears, but judgemental parents of NT kids, please consider that our late talking kids are drawn to screens because they have brains that are more inclined for visual-analytical learning - in the early years at least - over the more typical social-type learning style. Not because we are worse at parenting than you are.😆

Could it be because of lockdowns? If a child could not learn social skills at a key stage in their development, might it not be very difficult to make up for it later?

To follow on from this, because I haven't seen it mentioned yet, we have also seen a rise of the only child families.

Having elder siblings helps with social skills and speech.

Bit harder to do if you don't have siblings, especially in lockdown!

It's electronic babysitters.

I wonder if smaller/more so dispersed families aren't helping either. If you haven't had Siblings/Grandparents/Uncles/Aunts/Cousins near by when growing up, it's much harder to learn how to parent and pass those skills on. You also don't have childcare on tap so that occasionally you can have a breather from the children or clean without them wreaking the place whilst you do so, etc.

Just an example of the ASD rise in numbers, my youngest son has severe ASD & now as a family we know more about autism we’ve seen the signs in so many adults in our family. My grandad, myself (both ASD) & my sister (ADHD) have now been diagnosed. The Sara just said my sister was hyperactive & not to give her food colourings but she wasn’t actually diagnosed with anything officially as a kid. I was ‘advanced’, talking really early, very obsessive, very rigid with rules, not social, struggled with friendship groups but in the 90s autism was a ‘boy thing’ and not something girls had.

My brothers son (age 16) is in the process of being diagnosed & my sisters son (age 18) is also on the pathway but Drs not sure if it’s ASD or ADHD with him. When my eldest son was little I was sure something was there but was fobbed off as I was a young mum (age 19), constantly told it was all in my head etc. He’s now 23 & says he knows he’s different & sees so much of himself in his little brother, he’s being referred for ASD assessment.

It’s massively profound in my family. My boy is now 12, ASD was suspected at 9months his autism is that severe so in the past 11 years we’ve realised that so many of us have gone under the radar when in reality it’s pretty bloody obvious & I can’t believe it was missed. But it just wasn’t something that was really diagnosed, we were just the weird/odd kids that needed ‘a smack’ to sort us out, I honestly lost count at the amount of times we’ve been told that either about us (as kids) or our kids. There will be loads families like mine that don’t realise that so many of them will be on the spectrum

Working in early years, some of the advice and I put from professionals is absolutely laughable. I think there is some much conflict, we ba e children who spit and lash out (no obviously sen). We have to ignore the bad behaviour, offer them sensory toys and maybe rub there back to meet their sensory needs to help them self regulate. We aren't allowed to discipline them. They then get to secondary school and the teachers give them detentions over the most minute things like not having a pen! They just can't cope. The discipline and boundaries are not consistent. Parents are too scared to discipline their kids.

This. With bells on. Appalling parenting, kids to run riot.

She has autism to

Parents are more aware too and are more likely to seek help.
which of course media and the web have helped with.
things are easier for people to ask questions about reach out to others.
when I was small it’s not that people in the class were not acting out but their parents had no clue where to turn or it there was a problem.

For some reason, DLA seems harder to get for children with physical disabilities. I was referring to what I'd already comments about. Conditions such as ADHD and Autism, which are harder to prove.

Go to the media, if you can. They were very successful in a relative's failed tribunal case with their wheelchair using child.

That is great you are so educated - but with all the qualifications in the world, you are not that child's parents.

Of course it has nothing to do with a lack of SAHP, screens and pandering parents therefore it must be the Governments fault.

I agree with you it could well be evolutionary.

It makes sense that the digital age would select for autistic traits much more than previous generations. Autistic people can become extremely successful in the online world both professionally and socially and maybe therefore more likely to find partners and reproduce.

This spike in autism correlates with the digital revolution. Millennials like me are the first generation to be using tech in their careers and social lives in a big way, and the last 10 years is when we’ve all started having children and passing on our genes

So that I think explains the autism. And I think it is compounded by parents not interacting adequately with their children at an early age due to screens.

The mental health problem I think is also down to social isolation and social media.

I’ve been a GP for nearly 30 years. I’ve done more CAMHS referrals in the past 2-3 years than in the whole of the previous 25 years. I’m not sure this can just be attributed to greater awareness, although that is obviously a factor.

I'm a highly qualified educational academic with a first class undergrad degree, a PGCE, a Master's and a Doctorate, all in education. Combined with my 30 years experience actually working with children, I'm usually pretty sure of the parents that are lying about their child's issues. Plus they come to me when they haven't been able to get a medical diagnosis so that they can submit my comments as "evidence" that their child needs DLA.

Which I'm more than happy to do for the genuine ones.

I'm bemused by the posters talking about 2 full time working parents being a significant and recent factor causing problems.

I can only assume they came from previously middle-class parents where Mum was a SAHP at least for a while.

2 parents working full time was always the norm for the working class.

The term 'latchkey kid' I.e a DC coming home from school with no parent at home as they were both working so they let themselves in with a key that had was on a string around their neck or left outside the house was evident from the 1940s and popularised in the 70s and 80s.

Often, primary school aged kids.

My Dad was a latchkey kid at primary school in the 60s. Most of his friends were.

Dads were miners and Mums worked in factories or shops.

Kids let themselves into the house, commonly found some bread and jam for a snack then went out to play.

None of them had Mums at home wearing an apron, baking bread and helping with homework like the rose-tinted spectacle idea some MNetters seem to have of universal child rearing.

It was never, or rarely like that for the WC.

And funnily enough, those kids could all read, write, had social skills etc and left school at 15 and got jobs..

In no way is that recommended for child development or child rearing but they got jobs, lived lives, developed relationships etc.

They weren't claiming benefits, unable to work because of ND or MH 'issues' like so many of the young population today.

😂😂😂😂😂
i had to go to tribunal twice
with a child who had Mutiple organ failures. Still is not entitled to mobility despite being in a chair 65 percent of her day
With Multiple machines attached.