Our kids are feeling the pressure

New research highlights teen stress, the role of social media, and what adults can do to help

Hi there, sapiens! A quick note to say thank you to all of you who reached out after last week’s milestone post. I am truly blown away by what a supportive and encouraging community we’ve stumbled into here. If you sent a note I have not yet responded to, I apologize for the delay. I was in Omaha last week speaking at the Nebraska Hospital Association conference. While there, I also ate some incredible bacon, saw the Missouri River, and was repeatedly shocked by how friendly Nebraskans are.¹ Success all around, except when it came to catching up on emails. I promise I will get back to everyone who reached out ASAP!

And to those who are new here, welcome! I’m Jacqueline Nesi, a psychologist and professor at Brown University, co-founder of Tech Without Stress, and mom of two young kids. Thanks for supporting Techno Sapiens!

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7 min read

My high school encouraged students to pursue extracurriculars through a “clubs” period that met during the school day. One year, a friend and I started a club called Relax, End Stress Today (i.e., the R.E.S.T. club).² From my memory, the impetus for doing this was almost exclusively enthusiasm for the acronym. How hard could this be? We thought. And R.E.S.T.! It’s so catchy!

It soon became clear to us that an acronym, no matter how clever, would only get us so far. We now had to organize and execute 45 minutes of activities for a large group of students, every other week, for an entire year. We began to have regrets.

As each R.E.S.T. meeting approached, we would panic, racking our brains for some way to fill the time. We played yoga DVDs on a TV in the classroom. We took naps on the desks. We read meditations out loud. Things came to a head one week when we decided to make homemade “stress balls” out of balloons and uncooked rice. The meeting ended in chaos, with rice all over the classroom, stress balls unmade, and that particular stress you experience when you realize you’ve made a big mistake.³⁴

Let’s talk about stress

Stress has always been part of the adolescent experience, but what does it look like among teenagers today? What kinds of pressures are they feeling? And how can adults help?

A new study, out last week, lays it out for us: Unpacking Grind Culture in American Teens: Pressure, Burnout, and the Role of Social Media.⁵ 

Here’s what the researchers did:

• A team of researchers from Common Sense Media, the Center for Digital Thriving at Harvard, and Indiana University surveyed teens across the U.S.⁶

• A nationally-representative sample of 1,545 teens (ages 13 to 17) completed self-report questionnaires about stress, burnout, and social media use.

• Once they collected this data, a team of 19 additional teens helped researchers interpret the findings. This is a (very cool!) process called “co-interpretation,” and resulted in some great, illustrative quotes from these teens.

What kinds of stress are teens facing?

The research examines teens’ experiences of six types of pressure that make them feel bad.⁷ 81% of participants reported experiencing at least one type.

Here are the six types of pressure, along with the percent of teens who reported experiencing each:

1. Game Plan (56%): pressure to have your future path (e.g., college, career, relationships) all figured out

2. Achievement (53%): pressure to achieve the most, to be the best 

3. Appearance (51%): pressure to look a certain way

4. Social Life (44%): pressure to have an active social life

5. Friendship (41%): pressure to be available and communicating with friends

6. Activism (32%): pressure to be informed and outspoken about issues affecting the community and world

I know I’ve said this before, but this time I really mean it: the figures in this report are a work of art. I mean, look at this thing!

Where is this pressure coming from?

Teens report that this is coming from a variety of sources.

When it comes to social media, in particular, teens reported a mixed bag. For each type of pressure, some teens reported social media made it worse, some that social media made it better, and others a mix of both. Some types of pressure (e.g., appearance, social life) were also more likely than others to be amplified by social media.

Here are the top sources of each type of pressure:

• Game Plan and Achievement pressures were driven by adults at school (e.g., teachers, coaches), themselves, and parents/family

• Appearance, Social Life, and Friendship pressures were driven by social media, themselves, and peers/classmates

• Activism pressure was driven by social media, adults at school, and themselves

Interestingly, gaming seems to serve a different purpose than other types of social media. 80% of teens said that they game with others, and many reported that it serves as a “release valve” for reducing stress.

What can teens do to reduce stress?

Teens who engaged in more self-care practices (e.g., physical activity, time in nature, time with friends) were less likely to report feeling burned out. 

Here are some self-care activities, and the number of teens who say they’re engaging in them regularly (i.e., 4 or more days per week):

• Sleep (55%)

• At least one hour of physical activity (40%)

• Something just for fun or relaxation (40%)

• Time outside or in nature (30%)

• Helping friends or classmates (24%)

• Deep/meaningful conversations with friends (22%)

• Doing something creative (not for school) (16%)

Why aren’t more teens engaging in these self-care practices regularly? They identified three barriers: time constraints (i.e., not having enough time outside of school and homework), putting tech away (i.e., getting “stuck” scrolling social media), and, sadly, feeling that these practices are not “productive” enough. 

And what can adults do to help?

Teen focus groups identified five ways that adults (and parents, in particular) can reduce the pressure teens feel, and help them manage stress when it does come up. Many of these tips, in my opinion, apply to children of all ages.

Here they are, along with some helpful insights in teens’ own words.

1. Help prevent overload 

"One of the things [my parents] told me a lot is, take a lot of opportunities that interest you, or whatever, and be really open. But the more important thing they told me was: 'Don't take every opportunity.'"

Given the pressure many teens feel to achieve, they may need adults to occasionally step in and remind them they cannot do it all. Some kids need adults’ help setting boundaries to protect time for self-care and sleep.

2. Recognize the effort, not just the outcome

"I wish that [adults] were more understanding ... Because sometimes you do your best, but I guess they don't see it. So it feels more pressuring, and you just get more drained."

This is about what we say as parents (i.e., I just want you to try your best), but also what we do, both when our kids succeed and when they fail.

3. Share in teens’ joys (and have fun!)

"Sometimes we're excited about something and we really want to share it and we're having fun with it. Then when we share it, and [adults] don't see the colorful things that we see, and erase it off for a little bit and I don't know ... it just doesn't feel fun anymore. I just want to have a fun experience with my parents, with them having fun with me."

Try to remember to have fun with them! Kids really want to know that we not only love them, but we also like them. Take an interest in the things that interest them, and make time for activities that serve no other purpose than simply enjoying time together.

4. Empathize, rather than minimize

"When adults say, like, that your college major doesn't matter as much and that you can go many different paths in life, for me, it almost makes it more stressful. Because I feel like there's no clear way that I can control my future ... It can all depend on the economy or things that happen in your personal life."

It’s easy to accidentally dismiss our kids’ concerns in an effort to take the pressure off. Oh, don’t worry about it, we might say, it’s just one test! Who cares? Offering perspective can be helpful and important, but we want to be careful not to minimize their worries. Empathizing (i.e., I’m sorry, that sounds really stressful) can go a long way.

5. Get curious about teens’ social media experiences, and don’t assume it’s all negative

“I think adults should know about how teens use social media ... Social media is not the enemy. I know a lot of adults want to think it is, [but] there's so much stuff we can learn and expand on it. And like I just feel like it's the way we connect. And, you know, to be able to connect with people can obviously come with a lot of bad, but it really isn't the enemy."

Teens in this study reported that technology was both an amplifier and a release valve when it comes to stress. Social media ramped up appearance and social life pressures, but for some teens, was neutral or even reduced pressures. Gaming offered some teens a way to relax and manage stress. For others, social media got in the way of self-care. As parents, this is hard to navigate! The best thing we can do is try to table our assumptions, get curious about our kids’ experiences, and help them find what’s working (and not working) for them.

Note: for more insight and tips for parents on navigating achievement pressure in kids, I highly recommend Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—And What We Can Do About It by Jennifer Breheny Wallace.

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A quick survey

What did you think of this week’s Techno Sapiens? Your feedback helps me make this better. Thanks!

The Best | Great | Good | Meh | The Worst

1. The people of Nebraska were truly a shock to my (apparently) cold, Northeastern heart. As I made my way to breakfast one morning, I texted my husband in disbelief: Even the barista at the hipster coffee shop was friendly. Do any Nebraskans read this newsletter? If so, please confirm whether your people are always this nice??

2. I’m actually very excited to return to my old high school this week (!) to give a talk. I am assuming the R.E.S.T. club no longer exists, but we will soon find out!

3. It is true that the vast majority of adolescents experience some stress. I do wonder, though, how many high schoolers are somehow ambitious enough to co-found a student club, but also foolish enough to believe plastic spoons are all that will be needed to get uncooked rice into deflated balloons.

4. Pretty sure that rice experience was the origin of my fear of children’s sensory bins.

5. Full citation: Weinstein, E., Konrath, S. Lara, E.A., Tench, B., James, C., Mann, S., & Lenhart, A. (2024). Unpacking grind culture in American teens: Pressure, burnout, and the role of social media. San Francisco, CA: Common Sense Media, Center for Digital Thriving, and Indiana University.

6. Note that I served as a consultant on this study, but all opinions and stress ball-making experiences described here are mine alone.

7. It’s worth mentioning that pressure is not, in itself, a bad thing. We need a certain amount of pressure in our lives to motivate and guide us. In this study, the survey items specifically asked about “feeling bad” because of each pressure, so we can generally interpret these results as reflecting negative (rather than neutral or positive) pressures. For those interested, the full study questionnaire is available here.