Table of Contents
ToggleRaising Awareness: Teen Anxiety and Depression
Recognizing Teen Anxiety
Is teen anxiety a significant teen mental health problem?
When do a teenager’s anxiety and concern fade away?
Types of Teen Anxiety Disorders
Teen Separation Anxiety Disorder
Teen Phobias
Teen Anxiety about Social Situations
Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
Teen Anxiety Disorder
What Are 3 Things That Cause Teen Anxiety?
Recognizing Teen Depression
Depression isn’t something you can “snap out of” or “get over.” It’s a real medical illness that, if left untreated, can have a significant impact on a person’s life. To learn more about effective strategies, explore 5 ways on how to get over depression.
Is Teen Depression a Serious Mental Health Issue?
Behavioral Signs of Depression Among Teens
- Consistent gloominess, despair, or feelings of annoyance
- Abstinence or loss of interest in formerly pleasurable activities
- Changes in eating habits
- Changes in sleeping patterns such as sleeping too much or too little Having fluctuating energy levels
- Inability to pay attention
- Feeling worthless, ineffective, or culpable
- Self-harming and self-destructive behavior
Types of Depression
- Anxious distress is a type of depression marked by unusual restlessness or worry about upcoming events, or a sense of loss of control.
- Melancholic features include extreme depression, a lack of response to something that used to bring pleasure, early morning wakeup, a worsening mood in the morning, dramatic changes in appetite, and feelings of guilt, agitation, or sluggishness,
- Atypical features include the ability to be briefly brightened by happy occurrences, increased appetite, an excessive need for sleep, rejection sensitivity, and a heavy feeling in the arms or legs.
Symptoms: Teen Depression and Anxiety
What determines adolescent depression?
Two types of teenage depression
There are two kinds of teenager depression: major depressive disorder and dysthymic disorder. Dysthymic disorder, also known as persistent depressive disorder, is a mood disorder characterized by chronic depression and low self-esteem. This condition is described in the DSM-IV with symptoms that include low mood and a lack of interest in activities, but it is not accompanied by the periods of mania or hypomania that accompany many types of depression. This can make it easy to mistake for normal teenage moodiness, but dysthymic disorder can persist for years if left untreated.
What’s The Best Way To Treat Teen Anxiety?
Treating teen anxiety is not a simple task. Anxiety in teenagers is one of the most common mental health issues and can be very challenging to treat. Some kids respond well to antidepressants and/or talk therapy—a combination that offers the best chance at long-term results for most people who suffer from anxiety. In addition to these treatments, following the routine of positive thinking therapy can be a valuable tool in managing anxiety, helping teenagers counteract negative thoughts and build a more positive mindset. But it can be hard to get teenagers to commit to therapy, even when it’s in their best interests.
Ask the school counselor to meet with them (it’s usually free) and see if they can refer them to a therapist or teen anxiety disorder treatment.
Causes: Teen Depression and Anxiety
- Genes:Teens are more likely to be abnormally anxious and depressed if there’s a family background of such disorders.
- Traumatic events:Teenagers who have experienced trauma in the past, such as sexual abuse, violence, or being involved in an accident, are more prone to suffer from anxiety and depression.
- Brain structure:The brains of teenagers and adults are structurally different. Changes in the brain circuits associated with danger and reward responses might lead to an increase in stress levels in teenagers. Neurotransmitters like dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine may be at varying levels in teenagers’ brains with depression and anxiety. These have an impact on mood and behavior management.
- Negative influence: This factor can be in the form of negative thoughts. Teenagers may develop a negative worldview if they are regularly exposed to negative thinking, which commonly comes from their parents. Thus, the role of parents is essential to creating a positive environment for teenagers.
- Stress from school: Many teenagers experience stress at school, either because the workload is too much or because they have trouble fitting in socially with their classmates.
- Peer Pressures: peer pressure increases as teens become more aware of their peers’ opinions, which may cause them to worry more frequently about making mistakes or being judged negatively by others. Being peer pressured as a teenager can lead to anxiety and depression – especially if the peer pressured situation didn’t go well.
Red Flags for Teenage Suicide
- Manifesting a sense of hopelessness about life
- Giving up on oneself and acting as if no one else is interested
- Making a will, preparing for death, composing goodbye notes, and so on
- Misused drugs and alcohol to ease one’s emotions and sleep.
- Abrasive behavior
- Verbal threats or jokes about committing suicide
Diagnosis: Teen Depression and Anxiety
- Psychological evaluation: A psychological evaluation of the adolescent will be conducted by a doctor, psychologist, or psychiatrist, who will ask a series of questions concerning the adolescent’s behaviors, feelings, and ideas. They’ll also consider the adolescent’s family history, peer relationships, and academic success. To be diagnosed with anxiety or depression, an adolescent must meet the criteria established in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition. We offer free and confidential psychological evaluations for teenagers.
Understanding Teen Anxiety and Depression
Anxiety and Depression in Teens Vary
Treatment: Teen Depression and Anxiety
- Cognitive-behavioral therapyis a type of treatment used for anxiety and depression. It assists the patients in transforming negative thoughts into more positive and effective ways of thinking, which leads to more effective behavior. One part of behavior therapy for anxiety is helping teens cope with and regulate anxiety symptoms while gradually exposing them to their fears so that they learn that terrible things do not always happen.
- Teen yoga therapyis a therapy method that promotes healing, health, and total well-being by addressing the physical, mental, and spiritual components of life. Teen yoga therapy, like conventional yoga, is based on a combination of yoga ideals and a Western understanding of the human mind.
- Individual teen therapy: Recovery from teen drug misuse requires individual teen counseling. When dealing with the complex emotions of rehabilitation, having someone to talk to is crucial. A teen addiction counselor can assist teens in dealing with those emotions, identifying self-defeating behaviors that may have led to drug use, and teaching them coping and relapse prevention techniques.
- Teen music therapy: Combining teen treatment with music playing and listening as part of teen music therapy for healing reasons has been around for a long time. Different body regions correspond to different vibrations, just like in yoga. The musical harmony will interact with the body to mediate energy flow, which can help with emotional recovery.
- Teen art therapy is a therapeutic approach that focuses on improving a person’s physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and spiritual well-being via the creative process of making art. Many people have heard of “therapy,” but not everyone has heard of “art therapy.”
- Teen exercise therapy is a type of therapy that uses exercise to assist teens with mental health, behavioral, and substance misuse concerns. This exercise treatment focuses on physical activity at its most fundamental level. There are activities for every fitness level, from simple yoga poses to hard strength training sessions to plyometric training for running and jumping. Choosing a workout that you enjoy and can do regularly is critical.
- Teen spiritual therapy is a mindfulness-based therapy aimed at improving the well-being of teenagers. It is a kind of therapy that helps a person’s soul, mind, and physical well-being. It taps into a person’s psyche and teaches them how to use it to overcome obstacles in life.
- Outpatient teen treatment: Teens and young adults battling substance abuse, mental health, and behavioral disorders can benefit from outpatient drug rehab and mental health treatment.
- Teen partial hospitalization treatment program (PHP)is an 8-hour-per-day, five-day-per-week structured and intensive treatment program. PHP for teenagers is typically 3–4 weeks long and provides a higher degree of care than Teen IOP. This program provides integrated multidisciplinary clinical treatment to adolescents who can operate at a minimally suitable level and do not pose a risk to themselves or others.
- Adolescent intensive outpatient program (Teen IOP): The adolescent intensive outpatient program aims to stabilize teenagers’ mental and physical health and provide them with the knowledge, skills, and tools they need to get back on their feet.
It is an evidence-based teen drug treatment program that surrounds teens with professionals and a multidisciplinary care team dedicated to helping them get and remain well. Substance abuse treatment, family therapy, recovery programs, educational help, and a team to educate youth on drugs are among the services provided.
Final Thoughts
Frequently Asked Questions
Can teenage hormones cause anxiety?
Can puberty cause anxiety and depression?
Can you have anxiety and depression for no reason?
What are the adolescent anxiety and depression screening tools?
- Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale (DASS21): The DASS21 is a 21-item questionnaire used to assess depression, anxiety, and tension/stress. Patients read each line and assign a number to it based on how much it applies to them in the previous week. This is a shortened version of the DASS, which is a 42-item questionnaire that is freely available. Although further research is needed, data suggests that when administered shortly after detoxification, the DASS-21 may be suitable for depression screening in substance use disorder clients.
- Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7): This is a self-administered questionnaire that is used by mental health and primary care clinicians to screen for and assess the severity of the most known anxiety disorders.
- Major Depression Inventory (MDI): The World Health Organization administers this self-report mood questionnaire. Obtaining an ICD-10 or DSM-IV diagnosis of clinical depression is beneficial. It determines how severe a person’s depression is. It inquires about the clients’ sentiments and emotions throughout the last two weeks.
- The Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ)-9: This is a single module of the Patient Health Questionnaire that is concerned with depression. It’s a tool for assessing and diagnosing depression. In primary and mental health settings, it also determines the degree of symptoms. Each of the nine DSM-IV depression criteria is given a score between 0 and 3 on this self-administered questionnaire.