British teens - especially girls - the unhappiest in Europe

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The charity said its findings reveal a 'deeply worrying picture around wellbeing and happiness' among teenagers, adding: 'Alarm bells are ringing.'

A quarter of British 15-year-olds report having poor life satisfaction, the highest rate amongst 27 European countries polled and almost 20 percentage points higher than in Holland.
Among UK teenage girls, almost a third report low life satisfaction, compared to one in five across Europe, the charity found.

British girls aged ten to 15 are 'significantly less happy' with their life, appearance, family and their school than the average boy, with life satisfaction scores declining in girls but stable among boys.

The Children's Society said it is 'particularly troubling' that the gap between boys and girls is widening. Between 2015 and 2022 happiness levels among 15-year-old girls in the UK have also declined more sharply than the European average.
Data from the Good Childhood Report found that 22.6 per cent of girls reported being unhappy with their appearance in 2021/22, compared to 9.2 per cent of boys.

One teenager said their peers often feel they need to 'change' themselves to be accepted, because people won't 'acknowledge you or look at you' otherwise. They said people had to 'look a certain way to be accepted'.

The report said that the dissatisfaction relates to a range of factors including food deprivation, NHS waiting lists for mental health services, bullying in schools and levels of physical activity – with the UK having the fifth highest rate of pupils reporting no physical exercise.

It also found that the 'endemic' level of school absence in some age groups has a 'dramatic' effect on attainment and resulting life satisfaction.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13790299/British-teenagers-unhappy-Europe-quarter-15-year-olds-UK.html

Surely a huge part of it has to be lack of decent jobs without university, which comes with a shed load of debt. Even with a university education many jobs still aren't greatly paid like teaching or nursing (traditionally female occupations)

Youth unemployment in the Med countries is horrendously high!

I have a nine year old granddaughter and whilst she doesn't have a phone, she is addicted to gaming on her IPAd. During this school summer holiday she has become moody, sullen and 'tantrummy' when requested to come off it....and says she doesn't want to go out and engage in activities - because she'd clearly rather be on line gaming and communicating with her friends via tech.

It has definitely affected her mood and her general demeanour...and that is without the worry of what she might be seeing, or exposed to, on sites such as Tik Tok etc.

I don't think it's just social media, though media in general may be a contributing factor (tv, film etc).

I felt like this as a teen in the 90s, no social media. Though I do remember being affected by tv/ film/ magazines. I think I have a particular predisposition to it and I think it's linked to perfectionism. Plus experiences. Learning more about mindset, mistake making and other general confidence building stuff helped in later life.

I don't doubt that SM would have been like adding steroids to all this though when I was a teen. I remember joining facebook in 2007 and within a year finding it made me unhappy.

My oldest son doesn't seem affected by screens. But my youngest one is.

I would look at it in terms of overall health, at least as a basic starting position.

UK children are outside for less time a day than prisoners (under one hour).

Their diet consists of 60-80% UPF.

Vitamin D levels are chronically low, we are sendentary and obesity is high.

Yes, sure, screens are a problem, but imo they're a problem partly because of our lifestyle - indoors, on a screen, eating shit food with no nutrition.

At least some of that is due to our very regulated, risk-averse lives. Which are safer in many ways, but come with their own set of new risks.

I agree @ArabellaScott.

We've just returned from an EU country and it was notable how different life was for everyone there, especially use of bikes rather than cars to get around.

Which impacted town layouts; more countryside and general activity outside

Regarding social media and influencers, language has a definite role here. Social media is simply much less of a big deal in non-English speaking countries. I look at my French nieces and nephews (teens) and while they do use social media a bit it’s nowhere near the extent that their peers in the U.K. do as there simply isn’t the content. They seem to use their phones more like we did 15-20 years ago.

Having said that, I think there’s a backlash going on in the U.K. though - anecdotally, DS14 and his friends have no interest in TikTok, Snapchat etc. British niece and nephew (older teens) also uninterested (18yo uses Instagram for music related stuff but that’s it).

Are you saying that Dutch kids are particularly obnoxious?

Just for reference in case obnoxious is being confused with cultural differences.

The Dutch by their own admission are incredibly blunt in a way that we would consider rude. But it isn't. They just don't do platitudes or feel the need to be nice for the sake of politeness. It's innocent and the intent isn't malicious and other Dutch people understand it.

My Dutch friend really struggled with the fake British niceness of saying things like 'oh come over anytime' and not actually meaning it that literally, because what the Dutch say, they mean.

I agree that teenagers are seen as less than by some adults.

Many people view all teenage boys as potential criminals.

Once I was in a shopping centre looking at a shelf of goodies with DD who was 12. An old lady walked past and rudely accused DD of having pocketed one of the goodies. DD hadn't. The old lady didn't apologise, the entitlement and nastiness were oozing off her. DH and I were aghast and the whole experience shook DD. Would the old lady have approached and accused an adult in the same manner? A grown man? I doubt it.

People view teenagers with suspicion. Public spaces discourage social gatherings. Locally there are fewer and fewer spaces where teens can congregate informally and kick a ball, have a giggle or just hang out for hours with your mates, for free. This atmosphere of being disliked and suspected of the worst must be deeply unpleasant to be in.

Personally I don't think anyone is looking at what classroom methods are being used and impact on mental health.

There's an over reliance on rewards, stamps, awards etc imo. Whilst this can boost confidence it can also work against confidence in others. I say this as a teacher, though I am very lazy with handing out class points etc. But rarely see the point beyond getting them to tidy the classroom.

My youngest is a naturally really good reader; I recently praised his efforts with a book that was challenging but he managed well and and he burst into tears saying he "never gets awards for reading in assembly." Apparently there's a weekly award.

I avoid rewards and punishments as much as possible.

It's tricky when schools are very focussed on reward-based behavioural management. I understand that it's necessary to have fast, effective means of managing groups of children, but it would be interesting to see how moving away from that model might affect behaviour and results.

I fully appreciate it's very hard at school, as I've had many tough classes. I never found it had true long lasting impact though. And some kids just don't respond at all.

Uk schools have some of the highest numbers of pupils in classes in the world. Most have 15-25. We have 30 or more.

In my experience it makes it harder to build a connection and relationship with each child which does foster better relationships, behaviour, respect and self esteem.

This. It's really difficult for DS1 (11) to go out on his bike with his friends in our neighbourhood: traffic levels, crazy driving, lack of cycle lanes etc. Also there's such a lack of public spaces for sport. We were in Austria over the summer and DS1 was blown away by the number of immaculate public football and basketball courts we saw. Meanwhile our closest park has a ban on ball games and one which used to have football goals has had them removed and the grass is all overgrown. Time spent outside is so important for physical and mental health, and as a society we're just not facilitating children and teens to get that.

Yes, traffic is a biggie.

Hampered by a shite public transport system, at least where we are. You really cannot rely on it, so everyone drives. More dangerous to walk, so more people drive ...

Time spent outside is so important for physical and mental health, and as a society we're just not facilitating children and teens to get that.

Absolutely.

It's also notable that a huge survey of parks nationwide found that they're not used by girls nor have the kinds of areas girls would use.

I'm having some issues with internet but the report is from 2023 and entitled Parkwatch: Make Space For Girls

Ah here you go

www.makespaceforgirls.co.uk/parkwatch

The short summary is that 90% of the facilities out there are dominated by boys, who are 90% of the users.

Yes I'm not suggesting that Brexit is the only cause. Misogyny is the reason for the difference between the sexes, tho in my case it's certainly not a new thing. I get more & more annoyed about having to take more & more care when going out - I'm driving more places now, which doesn't make sense (tho I suppose it restricts my drinking) and having to "check-in" with friends to sort-of keep tabs on each other. Exactly what boys DON'T need to do BECAUSE they are the ones causing us to!

In my opinion teenagers are more isolated and social media gives a very restricted view on life. Teenagers don't get enough socialisation, fresh air or exercise and have poor diets. (Not all obviously)

There a lot of poverty, knife crime and disenfranchisement. Families seem less cohesive. Teenagers don't seem to have much to do with lack of facilities.

This is so interesting. I've banged on about school playgrounds and children's outdoor spaces being taken over by boys. My advice to DD has always been, "take up space". It will be great to show her this to back it up.

I don't think it's fair to say boys take up all the space. There has to be more to it than that.

Do girls want to play outdoors?
Why do girls not want to play outdoors?

Maybe it's time to ban school skirts. You don't see college or university students with skirts that barely cover their bum. They are all in leggings and jeans.

Even in the 90s the girls stopped physical games by about P6 (Yr5) the boys would be playing football while the girls wandered slowly round the school. And in secondary the boys continued to play football while the girls loitered in the school corridors.

Do girls want to play outdoors?
Why do girls not want to play outdoors?

These are good questions and it won't be the parks that are the full issue re girls going there, though it was noted that the design of parks was a factor

Re skirts and uniform there was research on this and skirts are important for some girls.

Most of the girls wear shorts under theirs at my kids' school