Teen Anxiety
By: Chris Harrison
10 Facts
- Variations of anxiety include generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), social anxiety, panic disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), agoraphobia, specific phobias, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
- Anxiety affects a sufferer physically as well as mentally. Some physical symptoms, especially during a panic attack, include shortness of breath, shaking, nausea, headache, rapid heartbeat, dizzy spells, and more.
- Surpassing even depression, anxiety is the most common form of mental illness in the United States. It’s estimated that approximately 10 percent of teenagers and 40 percent of adults suffer from an anxiety disorder of some kind.
- Despite its high ability to treat through therapy and/or medication, 2/3 of adults with anxiety do not receive treatment. Teenagers with anxiety receive treatment even less frequently – only 1 in 5 teen sufferers do.
- Biological factors contributing to anxiety are still being studied, but brain scans of people suffering with various anxiety disorders have often shown evidence of chemical imbalances
- In a college campus survey, 91% of the women admitted to controlling their weight through dieting. 22% said they dieted “often” or “always.”
- Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. For women ages 15 to 24, the mortality rate of anorexia is 12 times higher than any other cause of death.
- More than 50% of teen girls and nearly 33% of teen boys admit to using unhealthy methods to control their weight including smoking cigarettes, skipping meals, fasting, vomiting, or taking laxatives.
- An estimated 25%t of college-age girls resort to bingeing and purging to manage their weight. 58% of the studied girls felt social pressure to maintain a certain size.
- Men make up 10 to 15% of the population with anorexia and bulimia, but are the least likely to seek help due to the gender stereotypes surrounding the disorders.