Anxiety and the Teenage Brain
Arts & Ideas
BBC
4.2 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 2 April 2019
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Worrying is a natural part of growing-up. And yet the incidence of serious anxiety and depression is rapidly increasing. Psychologist Stephen Briers from TV's Teen Angels, student Ceyda Uzun and Durham University's head of counselling Caroline Dower join Anne McElvoy at the Free Thinking Festival to explore the possible causes and the influence of digital technology and social pressures. The discussion was recorded with an audience at Sage Gateshead.
Caroline Dower is a psychotherapist and currently Head of the Counselling Service at Durham University. She has a special interest in the experience of psychological distress, and the experience of anxiety in young adults.
Ceyda Uzun is a student at Kings College London, currently in her final year studying English Literature. She is a former Into Film Reporter and Head Editor of The Strand Magazine who has written on topics including mental health, identity and youth culture.
Stephen Briers is a British clinical psychologist who took part in BBC Three's Little Angels and Teen Angels, working with Tanya Byron. He has presented the Channel 4 series, Make Me A Grownup, The 10 Demandments for Channel Five and appeared on GMTV. He has written a parenting book called Superpowers for Parents, Help your Child to Succeed in Life and contributes frequently to the Times Educational Supplement.
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Producer: Debbie Kilbride
Transcript
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| 0:34.5 | music, radio, podcasts. I'm Matthew Sweet, and in a moment we'll be bringing you one of the discussions recorded at our Freethinking Festival. |
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| 1:35.3 | Hello, latest figures from the Children's Charity Childline show they delivered over 21,000 |
| 1:46.3 | counselling sessions to young people trying to cope with feelings of anxiety, almost twice as many |
| 1:52.9 | as two years ago. Maybe there never was a golden age when teenage life was free of stress |
| 1:58.5 | and care and the transitions from child to teen and teen to young |
| 2:02.1 | adult took place with ease. But a confluence of social media, heightened expectations of what |
| 2:08.3 | young people should be capable of, and deeper awareness of the risks of mental health problems, |
| 2:13.4 | have brought the subject of emotional distress and anxiety from the margins to the centre of debate. |
| 2:19.3 | With me today to delve into the state of research and explore the trends driving a new age of anxiety for the young, |
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