The importance of children’s mental health

It is the core cornerstone that determines a person's basic sense of security, social adaptability, and even physical health thresholds throughout his or her life. Its importance far exceeds the scores, specialty levels, and school entrance results that are currently at the forefront of most families' priorities.

I met a 10-year-old boy in the child psychology clinic last year. His math score has been stable above 95 all year round, and he has just passed the eighth level of piano. He is described by relatives as "someone else's child." However, he started to suffer from nausea and vomiting when he went to school on Mondays. His parents took him to the gastroenterology departments of three tertiary hospitals and had two gastroscopy. No organic problems were found. In the end, Later, he was transferred to our department, and after three conversations, he finally found out: his parents had set a rule since he was in elementary school, "If you don't get a perfect score in the exam, you haven't tried your best." He got a 92 in the math test at the end of the last semester, and his parents locked him in the study room crying until midnight.

Interestingly, the value judgments of different schools of psychology on children’s mental health have different starting points, but their conclusions are surprisingly consistent. Psychoanalytically oriented scholars will refer to Winnicott's "good enough mother" theory, believing that the emotional support a child acquires before the age of 3 is the foundation of the entire personality. Children whose emotions are seen and accepted when they are young are less likely to have extreme reactions when they encounter setbacks when they grow up. ； Researchers in the behaviorist school do not engage in such "virtual" behavior. They speak with data: every time a child takes the initiative to express emotions and receives positive feedback, it will strengthen his future social initiative. In turn, if he said "I am sad" as a child and was scolded as "hypocritical" and "why cry for such a trivial matter", the probability of developing emotional problems in adulthood will be 2.4 times higher.

Don’t think that these are just psychological effects. When it comes to physical development, the role of children’s mental health cannot be underestimated. Data from the 2023 National Youth Psychology Survey by the Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences show that children who suffer from anxiety and depression lasting for more than three months in childhood are 2.1 times more likely to suffer from sleep disorders in adolescence than ordinary children, and the probability of suffering from high blood pressure and autoimmune system diseases in adulthood is also 37% higher. To put it bluntly, if your emotions are blocked for a long time, your body will recover sooner or later.

Of course, there have always been different voices regarding the importance of children's mental health. The most common one is that "the older generation didn't care about psychology, and the children have grown up. Now it's all the experts who are deliberately alarmist." This statement is supported by reality: in an era of material scarcity, the primary goal of a family was to feed and clothe their children, and mental health was indeed not a priority. Moreover, the loose growing environment at that time also digested many emotional problems: after school, I ran all over the alley to play with my friends, I fell and felt wronged, and I forgot about it after being crazy with my companions for half an hour. This natural social buffer helped many people digest the emotional pressure of their original families. But in the current social environment, this logic does not work: today's children have been stuffed into the comparison system since entering kindergarten. Little red flowers, interest class ratings, and test rankings are everywhere. After school, they either go to cram schools or stay at home. There are very few outlets to freely relieve their emotions. It is not that children have become fragile, but that the stressful environment they face has changed long ago.

Last month, I went to a nearby elementary school to give a popular psychology lecture. When get out of class was over, a little girl secretly slipped me a crayon drawing of a black house. Inside, two adults were quarreling with their hands on their hips, and the little one was squatting in the corner crying. She is the monitor of her class. She is always cheerful and smiling in front of her teachers and classmates. No one knows that her parents have recently divorced. She has to sit on the fitness equipment in the community for half an hour every day after school. She waits until the quarrel at home is over before she dares to open the door. She is afraid that her parents will say "kids should not interfere with adults' business" as soon as she enters. You see, children's emotions never disappear, they are just hidden by them. If they are hidden for a long time, problems will occur sooner or later.

I have been doing children's psychological intervention for almost 8 years, and I have encountered too many cases like this. Many parents wait until their children have obvious problems such as being tired of studying, self-injury, and social phobia before rushing to find them. At this time, it often takes several times more time and energy to make adjustments. Just like the little boy who vomited as soon as he went to school, he played sandbox games for half a year, and his parents also followed him for three months of family consultation. Only then did he dare to say in front of his parents for the first time, "I'm afraid you won't love me if I don't do well in the exam."

I came across a short video two days ago. There was a father squatting on the ground, taking his son's test paper that scored 70 points, touching his head and saying, "It doesn't matter if you don't do well in the exam, as long as you don't suffer any injustice in school. Health and happiness are more important than anything else." A lot of people in the comment area said that this father was too indulgent and would be useless when he grows up. I think this is the real long-term perspective. After all, we have never raised a child to raise a test machine that can only get full marks. We want to raise a living person who can catch the ups and downs of life, can feel whether the flowers on the roadside are beautiful, and can get up and keep walking after a fall. The basis of all this is that he has had a healthy and resilient heart since he was a child.