Jonathan Haidt’s New York Times bestseller The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness has resonated with tens of thousands of parents who are concerned about the addict-like behavior of their kids when it comes to their smartphones. And it’s not only people with children who are concerned: The American Psychological Association, Common Sense Media, and U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who has called for social media platforms to come with warning labels, are all on high alert regarding the effect of smartphones and social media on adolescents’ mental health.
Still, Haidt’s claim—that Gen Z kids are different from their predecessors in terms of mental health because they’ve grown up on smartphones—as well as his suggestions for dialing it back, have prompted much pushback.
