The Upstream Cause of the Youth Mental Health Crisis is the Loss of Community

We've forgotten what community really means.

Intro from Zach Rausch and Jon Haidt:

Today, we publish our third post on what we now call the “first act” of The Anxious Generation: the loss of community. (The second act is the loss of the play-based childhood. The third act is the rise of the phone-based childhood.) In our first post, Zach discussed Robert Putnam’s essential work on the decline of social capital and trust, which happened in part because new individualizing technologies (such as television) emerged and participation in local and communal activities waned. As communities weakened and trust eroded, so did the play-based childhood.

In the second post, we featured an essay by Seth Kaplan, author and lecturer at Johns Hopkins who studies fragile states. In it, he argued that to restore the play-based childhood, we must first rebuild strong in-person local communities. In this post, Seth takes his argument one step further, asserting that the upstream cause of the youth mental health crisis is the loss of community. As we are offered new virtual ways to connect with one another, Seth contends that we are only growing further apart. 

We note that the first generation to move its social life onto social media platforms immediately became the loneliest generation on record. There is a spectrum of approaches that we as a society can take to address the crushing loneliness of Gen Z and Gen Alpha. On one end is doubling down on technology, typified by the recent introduction of the creepy AI “friend” orb, which young people can wear around their necks so that they always have a “friend” to talk with. On the other end is to focus on strengthening the real-world human communities and neighborhoods we live in. Seth advocates for the latter and provides us with a roadmap to get there.

— Zach and Jon

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Jonathan Haidt and Zach Rausch argue that the loss of community is one of three factors behind the deterioration in youth mental health, along with the decline of play and the emergence of phone-mediated childhood. But in this article, I argue that it’s actually the dominant factor since it is upstream from the other two. 

The rapid spread of smartphones in the early 2010s triggered the dramatic uptick in mental distress among youth, but this happened especially in places where the social system supporting them was already hollowed out. As Rausch writes, kids who live in well-rooted “real-world communities … spending more time engaging in their local community – attending religious services, working, spending more time with trusted adults, and spending more time with their friends in person” — are less likely to experience the harms of the phone-based childhood. Where community is strong, the impact has been softened.

In this post, I argue that kids need real-world community to thrive and that the weakening (and even breakdown) of neighborhood communities across many countries explains many of the problems facing youth today—from screen addiction and the decline in mental health to rising drug addiction and growing loneliness.

What is Community?

The term “community” is often used, but its meaning is rarely articulated. It is sometimes conflated with a “sense of community,” which can be produced by working with a dedicated group of volunteers or in a close-knit organization. But, an actual community is more permanent and is much harder to create. A prototypical community consists of most or all of the following:

• A web of overlapping, affect-laden associations and relationships that crisscross and reinforce each other;

• A set of shared values, norms, and goals—a common culture that unifies and constrains;

• A common identity, ideally based on a common history and narrative and recognition of mutual interdependence;

• Shared rituals that celebrate the group, its past, and future;

• High levels of trust;

• High levels of commitment, with limited options for (or high costs to) exit;

• Recognition of and respect for common authority figures who guide the group’s decision-making;

• Keystone actors and institutions that bridge and bond different members together;

• A diverse range of skills and personalities that can contribute complementary things of value (e.g., money, time, expertise) to the group;

• Role models who exhibit the cultural behaviors that the group should ideally replicate or at least aspire to;

• Exhibiting a high degree of inclusiveness by actively seeking to encompass every member who shares the same identity or location;

• Capacity to strongly encourage through moral suasion certain norms of conduct and, if necessary, sanction misconduct.

As we can see from this list, a community requires a commitment to a certain social order—and usually to a place—that, by definition, must constrain some choices. In return for security, support, and belonging, members surrender some of their freedom. This explains why creating community in America today is so difficult—few want to compromise their ability to make choices. This is especially true among those with the resources and/or capacity to relocate as soon as a better opportunity beckons—the very people whose leadership and role-modeling communities can ill afford to lose.

Why Kids Need Real-World Community

Much of a child’s learning and formation is absorbed from the environment rather than directly taught by adults; behavior is better shaped by modeling than by lecturing. The institutions (e.g., schools, churches, and parents’ groups) and norms (e.g., regular family dinners, neighborhood play dates, and the expectation that adults will monitor streets) around us shape our kids' lives in ways we sometimes fail to consider because they are subtle. These institutions and norms determine the strength of families, interfamily networks, neighborhood relationships, and communal support systems. They shape each kid’s attitudes toward relationships, technology, and life goals. For example, when adults and older kids in my neighborhood model kindness, generosity, and responsibility to one another, my kids learn that these are the norms we should all aspire to in a way that no textbook or teacher (or parent) can instruct. When my religious neighborhood turns off technology for one day a week—on Shabbat—we are showing our kids that embodied relationships and interaction are more important than our phones and virtual networks. These institutions and the norms thus have an enormous influence on the choices parents and kids make every day, and on how vulnerable the latter are to various challenges like smartphones, drug use, and gang involvement.

As I documented in a previous essay at After Babel, unsupervised, child-directed play was in decline long before kids had smartphones. Why? Because place-based institutions and the communities they support were in decline. Instead of spending time with peers in the neighborhood (the norm for millennia because we all lived in place-based communities), kids were already spending much of their time outside of school at home with televisions, computers, or video games. More affluent children had many of their activities organized for them by their parents, putting them in a variety of highly structured functional groups with different kids rather than repeatedly playing freely with their neighbors. This oversupervision or “coddling”—the subject of the 2018 book co-authored by Greg Lukianoff and Jon—made the attractions of smartphones and social media even more appealing. The newest devices and apps are just one more chapter in the transformation of American childhood.

Many praise the myriad benefits that smartphones and social media are said to bring; online connection can give a person a sense of “community,” we are told.  We can find new friends, discover just about any idea imaginable, network, and even date through our phones. We can video chat with hundreds of people simultaneously from far-flung locations. We can pursue learning largely untethered from any physical space. Based on all of this, it would be easy to assume that place doesn’t matter.

I disagree. Physical place actually matters far more than we realize, especially as our lives become ever more placeless.

As Jon writes in The Anxious Generation, only real-world (place-based) social relationships and interactions have the four features that have characterized human interactions for millions of years. Such interactions are embodied, they are  synchronous, they involve one-to-one or one-to-several communications, and they have a high bar for entry and exit. In contrast, virtual interactions are typically disembodied and asynchronous, involve one-to-many communications, and have a low bar for entry and exit. The challenge today is that smartphones and other digital devices bring so many interesting experiences to children and adolescents that they cause a serious problem: They reduce interest in all non-screen-based forms of experience. Virtual networks are not only insufficient replacements for communities, but their proliferation makes the establishment of communities more difficult.

We’ve Forgotten What Community Is

Community—and the relational security blanket it provides—is essential to the health and well-being of our children. Yet, over the last two generations, the U.S. has moved from a “townshipped” society in which neighbors regularly communicated and collaborated with each other through a host of place-based institutions to a “networked” and technologically-driven one in which local neighborhoods, schools, churches, and civic organizations are less important, and therefore they have weakened over time. 

“The Quest for Community,” in the words of Robert Nisbet, continues unabated, but today, the term “community” is often used in ways that are aspirational and limitless (e.g., many online advertisements for new social networks)—quite different from the original meaning of the term. Indeed, it’s a good example of “term inflation” — the stretching of a good idea to promote values and goals quite different from what is meant.

Image. “Build a thriving community.” Thinkific Academy.

Why? Perhaps fewer individuals have any experience of what community really means. Young people are marketed to and formed by the twin pursuits of convenience and choice while simultaneously being told that a person’s chief purpose is to express themselves (usually through consumption). This vision of the good life is part of the next generation’s socialization. It feels “natural” to them, and yet it does little to prepare them for the demands and delights of membership in a community.   

Community differs significantly from friendships, social networks, or what is experienced online. Whereas communities offer mutual support in times of good and bad and are bolstered by robust institutions and norms encouraging frequent, positive interactions, care and concern for one another, and ample opportunities to work together towards common goals, the alternatives typically fall short on these elements. 

While one-to-one relationships, a string of individual 1:1 relationships, or participation in an online group can provide some benefits—including a feeling of connection—they fall far short of actually producing community, which requires overlapping institutions and activities, things that are very hard to achieve if you don’t share a physical place with one another. 

Virtual groups are transitory and thin rather than permanent and thick. They cannot provide the dense web of supportive social ties that act like a security blanket when in need or the breadth of informal supportive daily interactions that are the lifeblood of a true community. Most online networks, for example, are instrumental, serving to connect people with a common history or interest or need together, as with Facebook or Discord Groups. They offer a stream of messages and connections, useful information, entertainment, and sometimes notes of support — from known and unknown people. 

Some of these sell themselves as online communities — think of the concept of “finding or creating community” through hashtags — where users find photos and videos of other people who share like-minded views (and then they like, comment, and share those photos and videos). But these fall far short of the meaning of community. On the net, online groups are more transactional, engendering little sense of mutual responsibility, and not necessarily useful when you need help nor protective when you are vulnerable. The norms of mutual support are significantly weakened and there is little of the sense of common destiny that a place-based community produces. Who would you rather call when in trouble - a real person you see regularly down the block from you or someone online who you have never met in person? 

Image. “What makes up a YouTube Community.” Source: WixEncyclopedia

It’s worth noting that online communities are also voluntary, with many being platforms built for expression or personal advancement. Few provide the diversity of personalities, experiences, income levels, and outlooks that were common in most neighborhoods a few decades ago. Few provide the incentives to earn recognition through the force of character rather than a performative act about oneself. Few provide multifaceted psychological and practical support when needed for members who feel vulnerable or fall into practical difficulties. 

None of this is to say that online networks and relationships don’t have significant value. In some cases, the virtual world can enhance pre-existing real-world relationships and groups. In others, it can connect people who would never meet otherwise. My point, however, is that we need to recognize that they are not sufficient replacements for what real-world in-person relationships and communities offer and that we should have a clear view of the limitations, which are significant.

Restoring Community

I moved to my current neighborhood, Kemp Mill, just north of Washington, D.C., 12 years ago to raise a family and (mostly) put an end to my nomadic wanderings. It offered something that few neighborhoods could—a real community with high levels of hospitality and social trust. It is as institutionally thick as any place I have been in America, with these institutions nurturing the deep social ties and tight web of associations that bind us together and enhance our lives in countless invisible ways. The benefits of such ties are apparent every time we face a difficulty—whether it involves safety, technology, or a pandemic.

Images. The Kemp Mill neighborhood. Bake sales, kids playing, and presents from neighbors.

When COVID-19 struck Kemp Mill, we found that our in-person networks had prepared us to weather such a challenge. A large number of volunteers appeared, ready to distribute food, masks, and medicine to the homebound and set up outdoor pods for kids to play. While many schools around the country went virtual for extended periods of time, ours made every effort to reopen within months by leveraging the medical talent in the neighborhood to develop nuanced procedures to safeguard everyone. Streams of volunteers supplemented what school staff could manage. Meanwhile, synagogues organized new virtual activities for kids and shifted their many programs for adults online. Neighbors hosted social gatherings in their front yards and encouraged kids to spend time together in the back yards. In sum, neighborliness and helpfulness were the default behavior. While I often hear about the negative aftereffects of COVID when meeting educators and parents elsewhere, I do not hear the same complaints from the families in our school.

I am thus not worried about social media’s impact on my kids. As a strong kids-centered community, we do not need the government’s help to restrict kids’ use of social media. Our school and the parents of our children’s classmates already carefully monitor what information children consume. Youth get their phones at a later age than elsewhere in America, and our schools do not allow them anywhere near a classroom. Moreover, most receive older-style cell phones that cannot access social media. My kids are active readers, borrowing books from the local library and subscribing to compelling magazines and book subscriptions. And they regularly spend joyful time with their classmates and neighboring kids, going hours and hours together talking, playing board games and cards, singing, competing in sports, or just walking around—with no phones in sight. In observing our faith, our whole community also regularly spends time (on the Sabbath and major holidays) with no access to any media at all. Parents model that they too know how to set their phones aside and attend to real community, in space and time.

If you are a parent and want to join or build a community to enmesh your kids in, what can you do? Here are a few ideas to get started.

First, you can select a place to live based on its social wealth. When my wife and I were ready to have kids, we were determined to find a supportive community to live in. We spent a year checking out half a dozen options between New York City (where we lived) and Washington, D.C. (where I was doing more work). In most cases, we visited, stayed overnight, met lots of people, and asked lots of questions. In the end, we chose the D.C. suburb where I live now—a warm, welcoming, and institutionally rich place.

Second, consider how you can befriend neighbors and other parents in your immediate vicinity. Try the 8 Front Door Challenge, which helps you plan and host a Get-Together with neighbors closest to you. Participate in organizations or activities in your neighborhood. Spend time in places where people congregate locally. Organize a block party or play street. Create a neighborly block. 

Third, leverage local institutions to build neighborhood community. Schools are best placed for this because of their direct ties to local families and kids, but libraries, local businesses, houses of worship, and any other entity with strong ties to your locale can play an important role. A parents’ group based on the families from the schools in your neighborhood would not only build stronger ties between families but also provide a platform to organize activities where residents get to know each other and develop a stronger sense of mutual support and trust. Working with the local library to organize activities in or geared towards your specific neighborhood would create an opportunity for residents to meet one another. A church, synagogue, or mosque could more proactively embrace the neighborhood, as members of Parish Collective do. As for businesses, many have an active interest in building social ties with neighbors. Might they want to hold events, contribute to building community, or invest in some way to strengthen local relationships among neighbors? In general, it’s always easier if you find allies among your neighbors, build partnerships with existing institutions, and leverage the assets (cultural, environmental, educational, economic, etc.) you already have locally. Think incrementally, building momentum step by step rather than thinking there is a magic bullet.

Conclusion

While it is important to debate youth use of social media, and whether the government should regulate it, what is missing from this discussion is the strength of “the little society” that kids inhabit daily. There are real tradeoffs in using social media, and external factors heavily impact the mix and balance between the positives and negatives involved. As Zach writes, kids “rooted in their real-world communities” are “less likely to move their lives so deeply into the virtual world.” Instead, they “continue to spend more time with friends and trusted adults in person. They are, therefore, less likely to become anxious and depressed when they trade in their flip phones for smartphones, and they are also better able to find social support, which may make online harms less painful.”

What matters for our kids is not online connections, but in-person relationships; not just individual friendships but the strength and abundance of neighborhood institutions. Robust communities will foster hundreds of relationships and dozens of place-based institutions engendering trust, fraternity, mutual support, and stewardship. These will shape how we raise our kids and how they will, in turn, raise their own.