‘Stark’ contrast
The most dramatic finding was the difference in mental well-being between younger and older adults, which was two- to threefold larger than differences in other dimensions (for example, age, gender, employment). Even the maximum difference between countries overall (15%) was still smaller than the generational gap within any region.
While only 7% (6%- 9%) of participants aged ≥65 years were “distressed and struggling” with their mental well-being to a “clinical” extent, 44% (38%-50%) of those aged 18-24 years reported mental well-being scores in the “distressed or struggling” range – representing a “growing gap between generations that, while present prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, has since been exacerbated,” the authors state.
With every successive decrement in age group, mental well-being “plummeted,” Dr. Thiagarajan said. She noted that research conducted prior to 2010 in several regions of the world showed that young adults typically had the highest well-being. “Our findings stand in stark contrast to these previous patterns.”
The relationship between lockdown stringency and poorer mental health could play a role. “The impact of social isolation may be most strongly felt in younger people,” she said.
Internet a culprit?
“Within almost every region, scores for cognition and drive and motivation were highest while mood and outlook and social self were the lowest,” the authors report.
The aggregate percentage of respondents who reported being “distressed or struggling” in the various MHQ dimensions is shown in the following table.
In particular, English-speaking countries scored lowest on the social self scale.
The sense of social self is “how you see yourself with respect to others, how you relate to others and the ability to form strong, stable relationships and maintain them with other people,” said Dr. Thiagarajan.
Internet use might account for the “massive” difference between the youngest and the oldest generations, she suggested. “Following 2010, mobile phone penetration picked up and rose rapidly. ... Mobile phones took over the world.”
Time spent on the Internet – an estimated 7-10 hours per day – “eats into the time people in older generations used in building the social self. Kids who grow up on the Internet are losing thousands of hours in social interactions, which is challenging their ability to form relationships, how they see themselves, and how they fit into the social fabric,” Dr. Thiagarajan added
Sedentary time
Commenting for this news organization, Bernardo Ng, MD, a member of the American Psychiatric Association’s Council on International Psychiatry and Global Health and medical director of Sun Valley Research Center, Imperial, Calif., called the report “interesting, with an impressive sample size” and an “impressive geographic distribution.”
Courtesy Sun Valley Research Center
Dr. Bernardo Ng
Dr. Ng, who was not involved in the report, said, “I did not think the impact of Internet use on mental health was as dramatic before looking at this report.
“On the other hand, I have personally been interested in the impact of sedentarism in mental health – not only emotionally but also biologically. Sedentarism, which is directly related to screen use time, produces inflammation that worsens brain function.”
Dr. Ken Duckworth
Also commenting, Ken Duckworth, MD, chief medical officer of the National Alliance of Mental Illness, called the survey “extremely well timed and creative, although it looked only at Internet-enabled populations, so one cannot make too many overall pronouncements, because a lot of people don’t have access to the Internet.”
The data regarding young people are particularly powerful. “The idea that young people are having a decrease in their experience of mental health across the world is something I haven’t seen before.”
Dr. Duckworth suggested the reason might “have to do with the impact of the COVID lockdown on normal development that young people go through, while older people don’t struggle with these developmental challenges in the same way.”
A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.