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

[MaryMaryVeryContrary]

It really seems like we have a looming societal crisis in terms of child development and therefore the quality of the public in 10-20 years time. Experienced teachers across the board seem to be reporting an overwhelming increase in delayed, aggressive and disruptive children. I’m extremely worried about how this will impact society when they become adults - it seems (as a guess) at least a tenth of children will be incapable of work of any kind, and many more will need copious amounts of support to live any kind of responsible life.

AIBU to think we need an urgent public inquiry into this and what is going on? It seems to be the elephant in the room and anybody who tries to discuss it is shouted down.

I’m sure some of it is due to cuts in services but surely that can’t account for it all - it’s very sudden and extremely alarming.

And less patience, more need for the dopamine hit of what they want to see and decreased tolerance of not being stimulated, particularly by what they want to engage in and don't want to be engaged in.

I'm in my 40s and although I've opted out of some of the more toxic elements of social media and screen use, it's still had a massive impact on my attention levels, my patience and even, my tolerance at work and in every day life, of things I don't like or am not interested in.

If I'd been brought up on being constantly stimulated and algorithms constantly feeding me what stimulated me, it would be much worse.

No surprise of childhood obesity/ poor mental health when:

Fed is best - no, healthy balanced diet is best

Lack of home cooked meals. I blame this on poor wages and poor work life balance. Not parents fault but employers paying poverty wages.

Screens - they stunt development (WHO report)

Lack of outdoor, free play

Too much homework, oppressive schools, stress of exams cause poor mental health

I'm sure there is more, but look back 40 years and you didn't have these problems. Modern living is the problem.

Go back to basics.

I’ve PM’d you this

Millennial here.

I was raised with significant help from my grandparents who were very hands on. We’re talking me going to their house for weeks and weekends multiple times a year. Chipping in for costs if school trips etc.

I have a child now and do you think my mother who had significant support raising me has paid it forward? Fuck no.

I’ve raised my disabled child solo and it has been a detriment. I’ve had to scrape by and really fight just to give my Child a fraction of the childhood I had.

and yes because I’ve had to do this solo I’ve had to cut corners with parenting even though I don’t want to. I can never be sick, have a break or breathe. Even discharging myself mere hours after major surgery because there was no overnight help for my child. I’ve had to rely on frozen meals and screen time more than I’d like even though I was super strict and haven’t allowed a social media or a smart phone.

I honestly think the lack of hands on support from wider family is harming our children. Wider Family helped buff out the rough spots because none of us are perfect.

One of the reasons not mentioned above is the lack of omega 3 in maternal diets which effect the brain development of the fetus. This study was published in 2020:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9897595/#:~:text=2016%3B%20Suren%20et%20al.,by%20detailed%20timing%20during%20pregnancy.

Lack of omega 3 combined with B vitamins is having a similar effect on brain decline and increasing levels of dementia and Alzheimers.

We talk extensively about mental health but nobody ever addresses brain health…..

I remember really bad behaviour in school when I was a kid and a lot of antisocial behaviour outside of school(less now presumably because they are all gaming). Loads of shoplifting as well. Schools could expel children far more easily which got them out of the classroom. I remember about 5 or 6 boys got expelled from my quite small year group(no idea where they went). There was also a lot of nasty bullying. I don’t think attendance was monitored quite so strictly and no one seemed that bothered if someone was off school pretty regularly. Mental health and physical health were not great with lots of smoking, drinking, drugs, anorexia, underage sex, self harm etc. Adults seemed to turn a blind eye so I imagine there wasn’t much data on it. I think suicide rates in teens are gradually falling.

Agree re overworked parents. Currently the people are to serve the economy which serves to make a few people both rich and powerful. A change from the social contract model we had in the 70s - though that included very disruptive children as there were always parents who could not parent very well. Short of revolution, and a rejection of the idea that everyone is an economic cog and thus is you are not cogging you are worthless (economically inactive = lazy so-and-so who would rather be at home with kids/aged parents/disabled relative than go and do a proper job). To rectify this needs a social change and an economic change. CEO (?) of Carphone Warehouse on TV this a.m. saying Britain needs to be 'open for business' and the workforce competitive; in plain English this means allowing the selling of infrastructure and businesses to foreign investors who are going to want fewer workers' rights as they put up the price of goods/services. This does not affect only factory and manual workers, it affects doctors, solicitors, professional people who are about to discover that their work too can be outsourced somewhere cheaper. Carphone Warehouse man wants us to keep on cogging. As long as we do so the fewer chances of decent lives for anyone, and we ought to be worrying about the number of children who are going to suffer for this.

There is one, that I know of. His mother thinks she can ‘cure’ him by cutting out screens feeding him a low allergen diet and giving supplements. He has made a ton of progress but it’s hard to know what, if anything, has made the difference.
I frequently see parents ignoring their child’s rare attempts to communicate because they have their own face in a phone.

This isn't new though. Drug addicts and people "of low intelligence" have always had children. Surely even more so before modern inventions like long acting reversible contraception (implant, coil etc).

Sorry to be a pain but could you also PM it to me

Utter bollocks, 5 adults not bothering their arse, no excuse

stop coming up with excuses for piss poor lazy parents

I’m constantly amazed by the stories of children not being toilet trained by the time they go to school. It is 63 years since I started school and in those days children were toilet trained, able to write their names and numbers up to ten by the time they started. I think it is a combination of lax parenting and screens that is the trouble. There were plenty of families in those days where both parents worked, mine included.

No to a public enquiry as they are so slow but yes, there's definitely something going on. Investment in education and children's mental health would be a start. Maybe a good use for the vat on school fees?

I work in mental health.

The pandemic has clearly compounded issues that were already growing steadily before. Children have suffered terribly. Gaming, over exposure to screens and social media, a poor diet, a lack of fresh air and nature based activities daily, vitamin deficiencies and a woeful mental health sector that is under so much pressure and can only see the most serious of cases. Overworked, exhausted parents that often can not cope.
I can not see a single political party even acknowledging the issue much less willing to address it.

I live rurally and the children here seem to be happy and balanced if I am being honest. Having a traditional childhood. They spend so much time outside, but I cover a deprived area and the issues are shocking, pressing and the real emergency we are facing.

Thank you, I will have a read.

Not a pain at all. I’ll happy send it to anyone who asks, just not sure I can post it publicly because it is behind a paywall.

Perhaps you get "shouted down" because you use vile, judgmental language like "the quality of the public" @MaryMaryVeryContrary .

Behavioural issues and additional needs are not matters of "quality". That implies that you consider children with such challenges inferior and somehow less worthy than children without those challenges. That attitude was well on the way to being out of fashion when I started school more than 60 years ago, when kids with additional needs were (barely) educated in special schools and some of the most challenging spent their whole lives in residential care where they were basically locked away and left to rot.

If you want to have a conversation about how best to meet the needs of such children, and how to improve education and support parents so that they can manage to do that, then try saying so without demeaning them.

I do wonder if a lot of this is linked to a drop in resilience within the adult population who then become parents. And the increase in anxiety and mental health challenges for adults now - linked to the availability of non stop news and information, and most people don't know how to cope with it. This plays into a passive parenting style when previously an adult wouldn't mind disciplining a child or having a difficult conversation or trusting them out alone to play - now adult anxieties mean they can't do this without getting triggered or suffering mentally as a result. So using a screen is a low conflict way of dealing. There's also an increase in badly trained dogs too as so many people see children and dogs as a lifestyle, or achievement rather than a responsibility.

Maybe the rise particularly in lower income families of mums being deserted by useless dads and having to juggle work and parenting. Certainly around me there's a huge increase in gangs and i attended a community workshop on how to tackle the problem - everyone was shouting police and teachers should do more - they can't, DH is a copper and the gangs are more armed than he is and every interaction with them is filmed by a passer-by immediately assuming brutality - there's nothing they can do as their top command won't support it either if it goes tits up. Anyway, one gent from the same estate who works to rehabilitate these boys said it wasn't the teacher or police's job but that of their parents and wider community. Having children is a responsibility and too many had multiple kids with different dads without the time and patience to raise them right. It was an interesting POV but of course you can't ever criticise parents now.

I'm not sure it will get solved until there's personal responsibility from parents - teach their children more than can be taught in a classroom. Bigger focus on active and creative pursuits rather than mindless screen time, and bringing back discipline. Also more adults ensuring they don't allow their own anxieties and neuroses to impact how they parent - making use of their own screen time to learn coping techniques online.

I think what a lot of people are calling 'draconian' rules in schools is actually just schools desperately trying to issue sanctions for minor things in the vain and misguided hope that this will improve behaviour overall, because that's actually the only thing they have the power to do.

So the largely compliant, well-behaved kids and their parents sadly suck up their behaviour points for forgetting a pencil once, or wearing not quite the right shade of socks, and meanwhile horrific bullying, vandalism and disruption go unchecked because the kids who do that stuff (and possibly their parents) don't give a shit about behaviour points and know that they'd practically have to strangle the Headteacher to get permanently excluded.

Totally agree with you. Children spend far too long gawping at those horrible addictive devices, their parents are on them too, rather than playing or reading with them. Mine aren’t allowed them and we don’t use them in front of them except for vitally important things.

Agreed.

But I also in part, blame social media/media for that.

Anxious parents often result in anxious children and if the parents are constantly confused by the messages they receive from the Internet, their parenting is effected by that.

A definite trend I've observed over the last 15 years on and off MN is well-meaning people leaping in to give usually unqualified advice which is based on what they've seen on social media or experienced themselves which doesn't necessarily translate to the issue the OP is dealing with.

I 100% think social media forums including MN have contributed to the huge rise in ASC/ADHD/MH referrals that community paediatricians and CAMHS services have seen.

I've seen far, far too many threads where an OP gives very limited information and is immediately told their DC or they/their DP likely has ASC/ASHD or a MH condition and should seek assessment.

And the Tiktoks, YouTube channels etc where misinformation is widespread and thoughts or behaviors that are really common, are presented as indicative of some kind of pathology which isn't always the case.

Agree with @Harvestfestivalknickers
There's been a massive decrease in volunteer run activities especially since covid so no church playgroups, massive wait lists for brownies as so many packs closed due to lack of volunteers etc.
Fear to let children do age appropriate tasks. So they don't get chance to practice and build skills in an age appropriate way. Children learn with age appropriate responsibility.
There was far more collective pressure in past. So a child would need to behave in a socially acceptable way to be accepted into group to play out with friends, out of line children would be told off by community and general pressure on parents to conform eg children needed to be toilet trained to go to school nursery at 3.
School system that requires everyone to be academic and pass tests. In the past children who weren't academic could leave school and work or late bloomers do night school etc. Lots of careers didn't need University and you could work way up.

I think this plus screens everywhere is likely a big factor.

I work in a school and feel the same. I see stories of reception children who aren't potty trained, can't use cutlery etc etc, I haven't experienced this. Stories if children swearing and being aggressive teachers, haven't particularly seen that either, no more than it's been previously when it's usually send related.

I think it's mostly the internet, social media etc tbh.