Megan Grady

April 27, 2018 Depression and Anxiety in Adolescents

Depression and anxiety are mental health issues that go hand in hand with one another

and usually begin to surface in adolescence. Students either receive treatment and learn how to

deal with the symptoms and problems that come with depression and anxiety or the issues will be

thought of as a phase and go untreated or unmanaged until the person has reached critical mass

and cannot go a day in a good place with their mental health. As an educator it is important to

know the symptoms and signs of depression and anxiety in students so that I can help students to

work through issues and to make sure that they are getting the best education they can.

Parent involvement in a student’s education is one huge factor in the development of

depression and anxiety. In a study that was conducted over two and a half years, Orli S.

Schwartz, Paul Dudgeon, Lisa B. Sheeber, Marie B. H. Yap, Julian G. Simmons, and Nicholas

B. Allen studied how positive and negative parenting behaviors affected students with regard to

depressive symptoms. They state in their article that while adolescence is a time when students

are creating bonds with friends and peers, “emotional and interactional quality of parenting

behaviors is thought to shape the emotional climate of the family” (Schwartz, et al., 2011);

students therefore are influenced strongly in their homes and the environment that their families

create. Students whose lives were influenced less by aggressive or submissive parenting showed

fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression than their classmates who experienced either of the

other two parenting styles.

As a teacher in a general music classroom, I need to create a safe and encouraging

environment where students are not afraid to share their opinions and be themselves like they

might be uncomfortable to do in other classes. Stress at home can come out in a student’s school
performance and as a music teacher I should be able to give the students tools to use to cope with

stress and anxiety at home or in other classes and in any aspect of their lives in the future. I need

to be able to teach them about responsibility and proper ways to interact socially. Because music

is a very social experience it’s important that I help them develop their social identities and the

way they interact with the world around them. Students from stressful home lives need to be

taught that there are different ways to deal with stressful situations and people.

Family rituals go along with family involvement in school, but it can do with things other

than school involvement that help protect a student from depression and anxiety. Research

associated with positive and negative aspects of a family that show patterns in depression and

anxiety or lack thereof. Sara Malaquias, Carla Crespo, and Rita Francisco put together research

that show simple things like family dinners each night are associated with “developmental assets

in adolescents, such as support, commitment to learning, positive values, social skills, and

positive identity” (Malaquias, Crespo, & Francisco, 2014). Even as students get older and

schedules get more chaotic, the idea of support and trust behind rituals like family dinner or

game night can stay and come in other forms.

The student Eric in Not Much Just Chillin’ by Linda Perlstein, is one other students who

comes from a somewhat chaotic home life. His mom moved away even though she tries to make

it seem like she is still down the hall, and he lives with his dad and his dad’s new wife who is

expecting their first child. At the beginning of eighth grade Eric has plans to get good grades and

be very involved in school but along the way things do not go the way he and his mom had

planned. She calls each day to make sure he did his homework and she tries to drive him to

school each day even though it is an extra 45 minutes just to get to his house from hers. His mom

is the main reason he got through eighth grade; she made sure he did his work even though over
the phone he lied about it quite a few times. His dad was not much help because he was not

home usually and if he was, he was with his new wife. Eric’s older brother helped out some of

the time which Eric enjoyed because it seemed like someone actually cared what happened other

than his mom and some teachers at school. His brother was a big help in showing Eric that its

cool to do well in school and it’s a big deal when someone does well.

Students like Eric need a strong support system in school because they are not getting it

at home could lead them to becoming depressed or anxious. The responsibility is then on the

teachers to give an enormous amount of attention to one student and juggle 100+ other students

who might not be doing too hot either. The support could come in smaller ways that might not be

tutoring the student or giving a lot of one on one help; just checking in every once in a while, if I

know they had a big project or test in another class and maybe offering to help or just

encouraging to do their best. Rituals that show support are very important to a student’s success

in school and in their future careers. Knowing how to show support to a student even in the

slightest way could change the student’s trajectory completely because they see that someone

cares and not only wants them to succeed but is willing to help them.

Hillbilly Elegy is a memoir written by J. D. Vance who is from the poor Rust Belt in

Ohio. His home life was something completely different than mine and I could never even

imagine some of the events that happen in his life as being real or happening to me. Towards the

end of the book when Vance is explaining his college career and the beginning of his relationship

with his will be wife, he discovers that most of his family has had “adverse childhood

experiences” (ACEs) which are traumatic childhood events that affect people well into

adulthood. Some that he experienced were: “being sworn at, insulted or humiliated by parents,

being pushed, grabbed or having something thrown at you, and feeling that your family didn’t
support each other” (VANCE, 2017. Pg 226). There is a quiz that a person can take to determine

the number of ACEs a person has faced; Vance interviewed his aunt, sister, girlfriend at the time,

and a close friend (both of whom were raised outside of the Rust Belt). His aunt scored a 7, he

and his sister both scored 6, and his girlfriend and friend scored 0. People who face more of these

ACEs are more likely to experience feelings of depression and anxiety like Vance did in his

young adult years. His mom faced the same ACEs as his aunt and his mom had different ways of

coping; she turned to drugs and his aunt got out of the situation the best she could. Vance noted

later that the pattern between the people who “built a successful home—Aunt Wee, Lindsay

[sister], and my cousin Gail—married someone from outside our little culture” (VANCE, 2017.

Pg 230).

Students that are in a culture like Vance’s need other examples of how to live and how

other families behave. Vance didn’t know that other people actually seemed to like each other

until he met his girlfriend’s family for a holiday and no one spoke badly of another like his

family would do constantly. Teaching students who come from these home lives would be a

challenge because they will probably not react the way other students would to confrontational

situations.

Anxiety has taken over in as a leading mental illness in adolescents and young adults in

comparison to depression. According to Lynn Lyons in “504” plans are used in schools to

provide accommodations to students with physical and mental disabilities; the ones for anxiety

are tailored to the student and could mean that the student can leave the classroom when feeling

overwhelmed and return when they are ready, or they could enter through the back door of a

school to avoid the crowding and social anxiety. Lyons believes that by the plans we are not

teaching students coping methods other than running away which is not realistic for real life
situations when they are not allowed a “504” plan. She would rather see a policy where a student

seeks out a counselor or nurse to “do some role-playing that helps the student ‘externalize his

worry’” (Denizet-lewis, 2017). This would be a much more functioning and realistic way to deal

with a student’s anxiety; yes taking a break is good and necessary for all students of all ages but

that is only teaching to run away rather than cope with fears and situations we are uncomfortable

with. Knowing how to talk through situations with students who are anxious would be a very

helpful tool to have in the classroom. My sister is a person who gets very anxious about slight

things that most people would be upset about, but she loses her mind; she was told she has to get

her wisdom teeth taken out at some point and she drove home crying the entire way (out dentist

office is at least 30 minutes away). Going through what could go wrong and analyzing a situation

is so much more helpful then pushing it off because that will create more anxiety for the next

time the problem presents itself.

Middle school is a very important time for students when they are finding themselves

apart from their parents and creating relationships with friends and partners in a whole new

world. Parents still have a lot of influence on students and the way a parent acts in a household

and to others they interact with has a huge effect on kids when the witness actions and when they

grow up and are able to deal with similar situations. Being a model for students in the classroom

and providing models of ways to handle situations and interact with people is very important to

me as a teacher because some students might not have the best of models in other aspects of their

lives. Being able to create environments the fight against depression and anxiety is also

important to me as an educator because so often the symptoms just seem like a phase in the

adolescent life cycle but sometimes it has deeper meaning that can affect a student as they grow

and mature into adulthood.

 Works Cited

Denizet-lewis, B. (2017, October 11). Why Are More American Teenagers Than Ever Suffering

From Severe Anxiety? Retrieved April 25, 2018, from

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/magazine/why-are-more-american-teenagers-than-

ever-suffering-from-severe-anxiety.html

Malaquias, S., Crespo, C., & Francisco, R. (2014). How do Adolescents Benefit from Family

Rituals? Links to Social Connectedness, Depression and Anxiety. Journal of Child and

Family Studies,24(10), 3009-3017. doi:10.1007/s10826-014-0104-4

Perlstein, L. (2004). Not much, just chillin: The hidden lives of middle schoolers. New York:

Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Schwartz, O. S., Dudgeon, P., Sheeber, L. B., Yap, M. B., Simmons, J. G., & Allen, N. B.

(2011). Parental Behaviors During Family Interactions Predict Changes in Depression

and Anxiety Symptoms During Adolescence. Journal of Abnormal Child

Psychology,40(1), 59-71. doi:10.1007/s10802-011-9542-2

VANCE, J. D. (2017). HILLBILLY ELEGY. S.l.: WILLIAM COLLINS.