Teenage is a unique and formative time. Physical, emotional and social changes, including exposure to poverty, abuse, or violence, can make adolescents vulnerable to mental health problems. Protecting adolescents from adversity, promoting socioemotional learning and psychological well-being, and ensuring access to mental health care are critical for their health and well-being. Adolescents with mental health conditions are particularly vulnerable to social exclusion, discrimination, stigma, educational difficulties, risk-taking behaviors, physical ill-health and human rights violations.

Common Mental Health Disorders

Anxiety Disorder

Anxiety disorders are not simply isolated feelings of anxiety – they affect one’s day-to-day living. They are characterized by persistent, excessive fear or worry in situations that are not threatening. In teens, anxiety might show as:

Constant feelings of apprehension or dread.
Restlessness and irritability.
Anticipation of the worst possible outcomes.
Racing heartbeat and shortness of breath.
Upset stomach and fatigue.
Insomnia or frequent trouble sleeping.
Feeling tense of jumpy.

Anxiety disorders may fall into the category of a phobia, panic disorder, social anxiety, or generalized anxiety disorder.

Depression

Depression is a disorder that involves recurrent, severe periods of negative mood changes, thought processes, and motivation. Teens and young adults battling depression often feel hopeless, lonely, and lacking energy or motivation. Common signs of depression include:

Changes in sleep or appetite
Lack of concentration
Loss of energy and motivation
Lack of interest in activities/friendships
Hopelessness
Physical aches, pains, and general ailments
Suicidal thoughts

Depression can affect school attendance, relationships, and general performance for adolescents. Particularly in recent years due to COVID-19, social withdrawal can create isolation and exacerbate symptoms of depression in teenagers.

ADHD

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is very common among adolescents, and is typically identified early due to this condition’s effects on learning and behavior. These children may have difficulty paying attention, become easily distracted, and exhibit hyperactive and/or impulsive behaviors.

Common signs of ADHD in children and teenagers include:

Jumping from activity to activity
Becoming bored with a task quickly and easily
Difficulty focusing on a task or paying attention to others
Trouble completing schoolwork
Difficulty processing information quickly
Trouble sitting still for a period of time
Touching or playing with everything
Acting without regard for consequences
Talking a lot and interrupting others

ADHD affects a child’s ability to learn and often requires creativity in classroom and home environments. Therefore, recognizing and treating this disorder can be integral for your teen’s future success. It's important for parents to know that about two-thirds of children with ADHD also face another condition. These may include a learning disability, conduct disorder, or another mental health condition like anxiety or depression.

Eating Disorder

Eating disorders are “much more common” during the teenage years and into one’s early 20s. While girls and young women are more likely to struggle with an eating disorder, it’s important to recognize that boys and men often go undiagnosed.

There are different types of eating disorders, some of the most common being anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge-eating disorder. Anorexia is characterized by self-starvation in order to lose weight. Teens who are struggling with anorexia will deny hunger, refuse to eat, and often exercise to the point of exhaustion. They may also practice purging, which is also common among those with bulimia. Bulimia is exhibited by eating very large amounts of food, and then forcing vomiting to rid themselves of the calorie intake. Binge-eating disorder (BED), meanwhile, shows symptoms of excessive eating – in large portions, over a short period of time – which causes feelings of self-disgust, depression, and shame. Those with BED do not purge like those with bulimia do.

Because eating disorders involve abnormal eating behavior, they come with risks of nutrition deficiencies, obesity, and premature death, though this varies by the specific disorder. Anorexia nervosa, for example, has a higher mortality rate than any other mental disorder.

Substance Use Disorder

Teenage is a heightened period for risk-taking, and often that translates to teens trying drugs and alcohol for the first time. Unfortunately, however, this is not always a phase or experimentation. Many teens and young adults become addicted to drugs or alcohol and develop substance use disorders.

There are many different types of substance use disorders, depending on a person’s drug of choice. The symptoms of a substance use disorder can also overlap with other mental health disorders. However, common signs of substance use disorder in teenagers can include:

Withdrawal from family or friends.
Sudden changes in behavior.
Engaging in more risky behaviors, such as sex, fights, driving under the influence.
Developing a high tolerance to drugs and alcohol
Experiencing withdrawal symptoms when not drunk or high
Feeling like they need a substance in order to properly function

It’s important for parents to know substance use and mental health disorders like depression and anxiety often co-occur. If a person is struggling with a mental health disorder like depression, they are roughly twice more likely to develop a substance use disorder as well.

PTSD

PTSD can occur in teens who experience a traumatic event personally, are witness to a traumatic event, or in rare cases, hear about a trauma that has happened to a loved one. “Trauma” can imply many different things, but some common examples are:

Physical, sexual, or verbal abuse
Serious illness or injury
Being witness to, or involved in, a car accident
Violent crimes (such as kidnapping, physical assault, murder, etc.)
Undergoing major surgery
Community violence (such as a school shooting or the suicide of a friend or loved one)
Experiencing natural disasters

It is estimated that approximately 5% of teenagers between the ages of 13 and 19 will develop PTSD; and the more severe the trauma, the more likely a teen is to be affected by the symptoms of PTSD.

Suicide & Self Harm

Self-harm and suicide are major public health problems in adolescents, with rates of self-harm being high in the teenage years and suicide being the second most common cause of death in young people worldwide. Important contributors to self-harm and suicide include genetic vulnerability and psychiatric, psychological, familial, social, and cultural factors. The effects of media and contagion are also important, with the internet having an important contemporary role. Prevention of self-harm and suicide needs both universal measures aimed at young people in general and targeted initiatives focused on high-risk groups. There is little evidence of effectiveness of either psychosocial or pharmacological treatment, with particular controversy surrounding the usefulness of antidepressants.