According to a study, released by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 7.5% of children ages 6-17 were prescribed medication for “emotional or behavioral difficulties” during a 6 month period from 2010-2011. More than half the parents of these children reported that the medication helped “a lot”.
In addition those children enrolled in Medicaid or Child Health Plus were more likely to be prescribed medication as were children whose families were 100% below the poverty line.
Male patients were prescribed medication significantly more than their female counterparts at a rate of 9.7% vs. 5.2%.
Missing from the study was the actual nature of the disorders being treated and the medication being used. One could venture to guess that the greatest diagnosis would be ADHD, but the study curiously leaves out such crucial information. Also missing was a description of what “a lot” meant to the parents, which is crucial to inform us as to whether such determinations are merely subjective or useful in some way.
These findings are curious as the data suggests that there are larger macro forces negatively affecting our nation’s youth. Is the nation turning to medication as a necessary alternative to full time parenting, as a result of the stresses placed upon households that increasingly have either one parent or have both parents working? If parents are to be the subjective determinant as to whether there is a behavioral problem, not the patient, it is worth investigating whether these behavioral disturbances are an abnormality for the child or simply unmanageable for a parent who does not have enough time or energy to manage the behavioral difficulties with other non-medical alternatives? In other words it is possible that cultural norms and expectations are creating a disorder where there might not have been one in generations past?
Clearly there needs to be more research dedicated to this subject on both the micro and macro levels. The nation’s youth deserve more than a blind movement that is the result of treating the symptoms without dedicating vast resources to study the underlying causes.
For the full study click here.
Written by Matthew Cohen, MSW
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I see too large of classroom sizes and overwhelmed teachers a huge problem. If the students don’t have similar Learning Styles As Teachers, the teachers don’t have the energy to differentiate. Students are then labeled. We are in a society where we expect everyone to be homogeneous. Lack of boundaries from parents is also an issue. I fear those numbers will increase substantially.
I believe people are so disconnected from themselves. I think many things play a part in behavior problems. I am convinced, however, that one of the main culprits is society’s aversion to being connected to one’s emotions, and to one’s body messages. Electronics, wifi, cell phones, cell phone towers, constant bombardment with electromagnetic energy and radio frequencies from wifi have got ot be negatively effecting everyone, but especially children. They are subjected to it from every direction – including all day long in school (as are the faculty and staff.) I am amazed at how many college students are on anxiolytics. I watch them pull iphones out of their bras or coat/pants pockets and talk about their anxiety and I think to myself, “Your intuition and your body are screaming for you to get that device away from yourself!” They talk about migraines and headaches and heart palpitations and insomnia (and the cell phones they sleep with under their pillow every night!) This alone, keeps people’s minds foggy, I believe, and the tech addiction factor is a huge part of this – it’s hard for these children to hear their deeper voice, I believe. It’s hard to find a way out of the rat race of today. I think it is a very different world in a thousand ways. The benefits can hardly outweigh the sacrifices as far as i am concerned.
It’s not the cell phones or electronics that has caused all of the disgusting displays of child abuse and neglect. Child abuse/neglect has been occurring at epidemic rates for as long as there has been documented history. It’s human selfishness and parental arrogance that prevents any change for children who are being sexually, mentally, emotionally, physically, and verbally abused. It’s complete and utter ignorance and greed that keeps children trapped in suffering, which creates adults who have mental illness and often become burdens to society. It’s a cycle that no one has the ability to stop simply because society has their priorities backwards. It’s the corrupt legal system that sweeps sexual abuse under the rug simply because it is much easier to silence a child than it is to silence an adult. It’s the selfish adults in society who would rather look away and ignore signs of child abuse that they witness so that they can move on with their merry life without the trouble of doing the right thing. Everyone’s attitudes and mental ideals need drastic change before any help will be available for abused or neglected children.
1 in 6 adults has some form of diagnosable mental illness because of unresolved childhood trauma, abuse, or neglect. Why doesn’t anyone see the correlation to the actual parenting mistakes and how the people in our society turn out as adults? It astounds me how stupid everyone is. Every single parent makes crucial mistakes, yet all parents wholeheartedly believe that they are a perfect parent. Most parents make mistakes that adversely and permanently affects their child for the rest of their lives. Let’s all wake up please because everyone is clueless, and the ones who are not clueless are selfish.
Parental arrogance is the norm around the world. Drugging their child is a common step for parents who are making parenting crucial mistakes that adversely affect their children. The USA drugs millions of children daily only to pacify the parents and not to help the child(ren). Children misbehave because they are being abused, neglected, or hurt in some way. Children are not born naughty or nice. They are made that way from how they are raised and from their daily environment. Nothing makes me sicker than when a parent bad-mouths their child or blames their child for their bad behavior, but in every situation where a child isn’t perfect their parents blame the child and are incapable of looking at their own behavior for the real problem.
For instance just yesterday there was a 17-year-old in a nearby town who was busted right before completing his plan to murder his entire family and then blow up his school. A passerby saw a strange young man in a trench coat at a storage facility and reported it. The authorities found bombs, ammunition, and a journal of how the child was going to carry out the murders. But instantly everyone blames the 17-year-old and villainies him. Hello? Is there anyone out there? Is everyone that stupid or are they just that selfish, arrogant, and ignorant? Obviously that young man has/had a terrible home-life and it is the parents who should be blamed and put under the microscope, but never does that happen.
Even in the Sandy Hook school shooting no one had the guts to expose the truth about the sick mother that Adam Lanza was cursed with. No one talked about how she alienated him from his father after their divorce or how she was so demented that she took him to shooting ranges, yet wouldn’t allow him to eat anything other than a sandwich when he was home alone because she was fearful that he would hurt himself. Nothing was said about how she had taken Adam to the emergency room weekly when he was in grade school and there were head wounds discovered. The world made Adam Lanza out to be the monster but really he was so emotionally and mentally tortured that he saw no other way than to kill himself and others. That is clearly a parent’s fault and responsibility.
Another case in WI where a young mother dated and allowed her young child to be alone with a convicted child abuser (he previously beat a child so badly that the child almost died). The convicted child abuser murdered her child but society felt so sorry for her that they never made her accountable in any way. Or what about the mothers who purposely allow pedophiles to molest their child so that they can have comfort and security? Some mothers will even allow someone to sexually abuse their child for a payment of drugs, but those mothers get no punishment whatsoever. Even Dottie Sandusky escaped any blame or punishment for actually adopting children for her husband to sexually abuse. She even heard the screams and did nothing, yet she walks away scot-free?
What is wrong with you people! It’s disgusting how children are mistreated in this country, and in this world. That’s not even touching the surface of the horrible and purposeful ignorance that adults exhibit every single day while they selfishly look away from signs of child abuse by their neighbors, co-workers, friends, relatives. No one speaks up and no one helps those poor kids. The adults in our country, specifically parents, are despicable and selfish.