UK teens the most unhappy in Europe

All the 90s reruns I've been watching come with warnings that "this programme contains outdated views and beliefs that do not reflect those held by the channel now"

This is half the problem. Everyone moans about "the state of the country" and no one speaks positively of it. It royally pisses me off how much everyone complains.

Dismissive or true?

We do love a whinge.

Good grief.

Dismissive or what.

I think just being ungrateful accounts for some of it. I don't think we're particularly good at instilling a positive, make the best of it attitude into our kids. They're not resilient.

I think we are, quite possibly, a nation of whinge bags. Just look at the threads on here!

To be honest from your list the vast majority apply to other countries, or more. Uniform is the main outlier but not all schools have strict rules anyway. Most other countries have longer school days and more homework in my experience.

Belgium also has long nursery hours.

I feel like the whole of the UK is less happy than it used to be so it would be surprising if kids and teens weren’t included. Standards of living have dropped, more people feel worried and on edge, healthcare is in the toilet, schools are struggling. Add a divided country which has for the last decade prioritised the old over the young.

Yeah I agree with all your points, and also want to add in screens. I think a lot of ‘anxiety’ is screen withdrawal.

Plus we’ve completely sterilised humour and made almost everything offensive or unacceptable. I truly believe people laugh less now. When I was a teenager we seemed to do nothing but laugh at childish or inappropriate jokes, but now we hold teens to adult emotional standards.

Or maybe it's the fact that loads of people seem to hate teens and kids in this country as evidenced here.

My kids lived in the UK until they were mid/later teens and were both quite miserable. Both had anxiety and found the educational system far too rigid and authoritarian. We moved to Sweden and they are both thriving, so here’s my comparison:

1. The weather lack of vit d. ( thats not new though). We have much drier, warmer and sunnier summers with 10 weeks off from school. There’s lots of outdoor activities to all year round (skiing, skating, swimming in clean lakes and seas, cycling on safe cycle lanes, skateboard parks, outdoor cinemas, commuter boats out to the islands etc.) in short they spend much more time outside.

1. Rise of the nuclear family. No more it takes a village..... Europe has more involvement with extended families. Not particularly the case here either.

1. Loss of youth clubs. Apparently they have them in Germany and its cheap and relaxed. Lots of youth clubs and other groups here and they are all free.
2. Too many organised activities kids can't be bored anymore and all their time is structured. Kids here go out and play without parents, walk to/from school w/o parents from about 8 years old. They have phones from much younger and sort their own play dates out.

1. Cost of living and see the pressure on their parents so no hope for things being better than them. Less pressure here but there is a lack of rental apartments.

1. Strict army style school system vs 90s uk and Europe.Blazer uniforms even if hot. Screamed at if have a coat on in the corridor, silent corridors. Toilet control. Super relaxed here and much more catered to individual needs, interests and abilities. no uniform.

1. Affordable houses, some parents can't even afford to buy. Depends on where you live.

1. Brexit knock on effect of costs and schemes such as erasmus being defunct. N/A

1. Lack of resilience and entitlement here in UK. I think this is linked to pt 10. There is a lack of freedom for young ppl in the UK. Everyone seems to be so scared of the outside world.

10. Helicopter parents and mollycoddling . Kirsey Allsopp highlighted this. A Dutch lady said kids walk to school at 8 in Holland. Apparently since M.Mcann as a nation we are more fearful ( don't know how true). same as above.

11. Nursery from 9 hours a day. Does this happen abroad? Usually not. Childcare is virtually free but most parents pick their kids up around 4-5pm. Working days are shorter here.

12. Sewage in water ( that would be adults too though). plenty of clean water here.

13. Too much homework. much less if any here.

14. The diet. Kids eat sweets on Saturdays and crisps on Friday. Breakfast and other meals are generally quite healthy. Less UPF.

15.15. Constant media input about the poor pensioners eg. The vast majority of pensioners are richer than the childs parents. ( obviously a lot are not but a high portion are) so shows a lack of understanding for youth. I don’t think teens think about this.

16. Underfunding health and mental heath services. It’s better here but not perfect. I have found that provisions for kids and young adults with ASD is excellent and it lasts well into their 20s.

It's because it's so hot. In the past, most city businesses would shut down for at least the hottest month. Now, international trading, etc, means far fewer businesses shut down. As with here, in some ways, school holidays haven't caught up with modern living.

Kids in the UK have way too much freedom in some aspects that they cannot handle properly while have way too little freedom in aspects they should be able to self-regulate in. Both easily lead to dissatisfaction and confusion.

But many education systems in EU countries are far more rigid and pressured!

Germany has a 3 tiered education system though so it's not purely British to have separation at 11 based on academic strengths. I think the insistence every child has a C in maths and English and every child could go to university isn't helping. It's seen as a failing to go into the trades, why? We need tradesmen and they can earn very good money.

The thing is though that “British weather” is broadly the same as northern France, Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Ireland and loads of other countries. It’s not hot and sunny 24/7 in Europe just because you go on holiday for a fortnight each summer.

Agree with this^^

We have far too large a gap between rich and poor in the UK. Too many children living below the poverty line.

It's fashionable to have some kind of mental health issue label and navel gazing is encouraged on social media. There is a middle ground between full British stuff upper lip and everyone has anxiety, we are yet to find it.

I really do think the weather here plays a massive part. I am so affected by the weather and I get very down and depressed on the grey, dreary days.
I imagine that a lot of kids/teens feel the same but maybe don’t see the link or recognise that it might be this affecting their general mood.

Why is this? Many reasons discussed in the media today. What do you think has caused this?

Austerity and Brexit have been big political choices that have both massively impacted the young.

Plus rising poverty and rising inequality, as discussed above.

I agree with this...as someone who studied in another country, seeing the stress UK students go through is really awful and unnecessary. Adding onto that the 11+ exams it seems like students spend a lot of time under intense pressure and stress, especially compared to other countries.

Yes. I think poverty is one of the worst things for kids. The gap between rich and poor is the most difficult. I have one child with OCD. But money means that we can access private therapy and make his life easier in many ways.

I think @Allthegoodnamesarechosen was right in her post.

I would also add (and have said this before on these sorts of threads) that every time the biggest marker of misery, addiction, ill health, mental health issues and isolation is poverty.

Yet post a thread like this and the complaints come thick and fast - too much time in nursery (which usually indicates working parents and therefore not being raised in poverty) and complaints about too many organised activities, too many exams with too much pressure, and so on.

Middle class teens have problems as middle class adults do, but generally speaking you won’t find them living in squalor aged 33 with their lives controlled by the opening times of the food bank, the goodwill of their benefits advisor and the ever present threat of social services.

I think social media is a problem, possibly more so for girls. The constant stimulation and constant need to present yourself in a certain way is just too much for anyone, never mind developing minds.

However, I think we have to avoid romanticising the past. I was a child in the 70s. I grew up with more freedom and independence. But I also had parents who didn’t give a shit about my feelings. Racism and homophobia were rife at school. There was almost no acceptance of neurodivergence and kids were laughed at for being weird. I know that still happens now, but at least there is a mindset that it is unacceptable.

I grew up unable to speak to my parents or express my worries or feelings. Same at school. I have gone the opposite way with my kids. They are now at university and despite thriving there, I would argue that yes they are less resilient than I was that their age. However, they know they are loved and that they can approach me for support at any time. They are much happier overall than I was. I will take that and have no regrets.

I have mixed feelings about these kind of surveys. It is important to collect data, but I do feel that the results can sometimes be overly negative and I don’t know how robust the information is. I’m not sure that telling teens they are unhappy, helps matters!