Recognizing Effects of Stress on Girls
With nervous energy skyrocketing, the girls of this generation need the adults in their lives to do far more than in the past. Along with general understanding and support, they need voices of reason to counteract both the stress-inducing messages they get from this culture and the demoralizing, self-defeating beliefs some of them persist in telling themselves. But for this to happen, parents and teachers first must recognize the distress underlying teen girls' attitudes and behavior.Many signs of stress are so common that they are accepted as the normal, even expected, cost of leading busy, productive lives. What teen, for example, hasn't procrastinated in doing her homework, overreacted to a situation with a friend, or frozen while taking a test? What girl hasn't lost her temper, been moody, excessively tired, or occasionally used aches or pains as an excuse to stay home from school? It is the rare daughter who hasn't taken out her troubles on a younger sibling or stayed up until all hours and then been late for school the next morning.
Every parent and teacher should be aware of these basic truths about the insidious, sometimes devastating, effects of stress on girls throughout the school years:
Young Girls Are Afflicted
The first thing adults need to know is this: Stress for success is no longer exclusive to ambitious high school seniors engaged in the nerve-racking college-application process. The epidemic in this culture has spread to ever-younger girls, infecting those on the cusp of puberty as well as older adolescents. Too often I hear the voices of girls who already feel very tired and defeated, though they have yet to graduate from the relatively protected confines of elementary school.
Alex, for example, came to see me because her parents were puzzled by her sudden reticence about school and meltdowns at home when faced with nightly assignments. A petite ten-year-old with blond curls and enormous, widely set, ice-blue eyes, her baby face looks somehow seemed incongruous with her anguish: "The second I get home from school I start my homework and I work nonstop until dinnertime. I get headaches so much and I feel sick. And still, I have to go to middle school. And then I have to go to high school. And then I have to go to college."
Middle School Intensifies Stress
By the time girls enter the early teen years and middle school, developmental challenges exacerbate stress in every area. On the school front, girls are suddenly asked to follow mind-boggling rotating schedules, keep track of a slew of due dates, and deal with an array of teachers--each with their own preferences, idiosyncrasies, and expectations. This is the sort of juggling expected of corporate CEOs.
Adding to these new demands are the social challenges, which by middle school rival or surpass academic ones in both intensity and importance. In general, girls feel desperate to reconnect with friends they may now see less frequently during the school day. They need to reassure themselves of these old ties by helping each other with problems and analyzing the details of all their unsettling social interactions. Well before they get to high school, girls say they face daily dilemmas such as whether to get sleep or good grades, whether to work on math problems or friendship problems, and whether to study history or reflect on their own lives.
A generation ago, tweens who had yet to enter the halls of high school might have been playing Parcheesi, dressing up their Barbie dolls, and jumping rope. Today these young girls are obsessed with calculating their grade point averages, managing their time, and getting into good colleges.
Pressures Skyrocket During High School
When the stakes rise in high school, so does the level of stress--for girls as well as their families. That is because the road to success is increasingly lined with specific checkpoints against which achievement is measured--for example, whether or not teens are in honors or advanced placement (AP) classes; whether their SAT scores are high enough; whether they are chosen for selective teams, music ensembles, or honors; whether (and by whom) they are invited to proms; and so on. Any one of these criteria can seem like the definitive word on whether or not girls are successful--or will be in the future. Jan expressed the pressures of many girls in high school when she told me:
The worst thing about eleventh grade is the pressure to get into a good school. My parents are pushing me to study harder. Plus, you get pressured by all your friends to spend time with them, to go to their party or hang out. Have this boyfriend; you need one. Or you get stressed about homecoming. It's a big deal. Are you going? Who with? Do you have a dress? And with all this, I hope I get into a really good school and don't die from the stress of applying.
The Toll is Real
Such issues may be common, even classic, during adolescence, but they are worse today, and suffering from stress should not be accepted as a given. In fact, these are the harmful effects on girls' physical health and mental well-being and, therefore, on their ultimate success:
Sleep Deprivation
Perhaps the most blatant consequence is the widespread lack of sleep among teens today. Though they require eight to ten hours of sleep per night, adolescents generally get far less. Not surprisingly, when girls in middle school and high school are asked about their worst school experiences, they typically speak of exhaustion:
- "The stress, sleep deprivation, and depression that almost defined junior year"
- "When the pressure comes on all in one week and I get very little sleep"
- "Every time I have to work until two a.m. or three in the morning and then sit through class the next day with a headache as time stops"
- "Getting no sleep because of work; draining myself emotionally, physically, and mentally; and doing worse in school because of constant lack of sleep"
Two, girls are deprived of much-needed sleep because of insomnia; according to a 2004 BusinessWeek cover story on sleep disorders, 40 percent of teens have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep. As girls often tell me, "My mind's going a mile a minute," "I'm too tired to fall asleep," and "I have too much going on." Regardless of whether they deliberately pull all-nighters to study or they toss and turn for hours in their beds, the fallout of sleep deprivation is the same.
Susceptibility to Stress and Illness
Lack of sleep and the impairment in thinking ability that results deprive teen girls of much needed skills to ward off the effects of stress. In addition, because of their compromised immune systems, they are more prone to illness. Getting sick and being absent from school cause additional stress because teens miss key class work or tests, fall behind their classmates, and have to work harder to catch up.
Increased Craving for Stimulants
Exhaustion also affects blood chemistry, provoking unhealthy cravings for caffeine, chocolate, sugar, and junk food. (Many teen girls would be horrified to learn that chronic sleepiness is associated with weight gain, which causes more stress.) In one school I visited, a student-conducted survey had found that the majority of girls drank up to three caffeinated beverages daily for extra energy.
Insufficient Exercise
Surveys also confirm a harmful decrease in physical activity among American females. A study conducted by the University of Michigan, for example, found that nine- to twelve-year-old children are spending 60 percent less time playing outdoors. Tracking girls over a period of ten years starting at age nine or ten, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute reported an 83 percent decrease in median activity levels. Thus, by the time they are older teens, many engage in no regular exercise other than gym class.
Poorer Coping Abilities
With a distinct lack of downtime, girls are less able to relax, sleep, read for pleasure, and exercise. This undermines their ability to combat both anxiety and depression. Similarly, without the benefit of solitary activities such as writing in journals, reading, and creating music or art, girls can't soothe themselves as well. Teens today are caught in a classic catch-22 bind: Too stressed out to take good care of themselves, they are that much less capable of dealing with tremendous stress.
Diminished Brainpower
Chronic stress also more directly threatens girls' success by eroding their brainpower. Without the restorative and memory-building benefits of a restful night's sleep, girls can't concentrate or think as well, and they learn more slowly. In fact, research shows that staying up throughout the night results in the same level of mental acuity as being intoxicated above the legal limit for driving in most states. It is no wonder that sleep deprived people perform many kinds of tasks poorly.
Also, emotions powerfully affect cognition. This relationship is the focus of much scientific attention today. New methods of mapping brain activity are enabling neuroscientists to understand how feelings and cognition interact in the brain. For example, one group of researchers discovered that mild emotional states such as amusement and anxiety affect college students' short-term memory. Neither emotional state nor the task alone made a difference; what mattered was the mood subjects were in while they did specific tests.
Plummeting Self-esteem
Chronic stress breeds feelings of inadequacy as well. Girls who find they can't think clearly or perform well understandably lose confidence. Comparing themselves to the idealized role models that surround them in this culture, in their schools, and even in their own families, many teens fear they will never measure up. They stop believing in themselves. They lose heart, not to mention motivation. Eventually, they stop trying.
Researchers confirm that less successful students self-handicap. That is, they sabotage their performance by procrastinating, studying for shorter periods of time, and barely reading their textbooks. This posture enables them to excuse their anticipated lack of excellence. If teens don't give their all and do poorly, they can blame lack of effort instead of lack of competence. Girls would rather be seen as lazy than stupid.
This story is typical. A high school principal was asked to see a tenth-grade girl whose teacher had sent her out of class because of how she responded to a question. When the teacher asked her why she had gotten a D on a test, the girl had replied, "I wouldn't waste my time studying this crap." When the principal later spoke to her about this experience, she confessed, "I'd rather be bad than dumb."
Thwarted Success
There is one symptom of stress that few parents or teachers can overlook: declining grades. This makes sense. The sheer number of hours girls spend in school, with all its simultaneous and complex social, emotional, and intellectual challenges, makes it likely that problems will show up there first. It is hard for parents and teachers to dismiss, rationalize, or justify poor report cards or test scores. They are most often seen--and correctly so--as red flags for trouble, perhaps even as girls' unconscious requests for adults to sit up and take notice.
Less often, girls manage to hold it together, silently and cheerfully going about the business of meeting other people's expectations. These teens don't complain. In fact, they seem to do everything and to do it all easily. They are model students and perfect daughters, likely to elicit praise and gratitude from adults. In fact, they are often held up as examples for other girls to emulate. That is, until they reach a breaking point.
No Girl is Immune
It is worth stating the obvious: Not a single girl gets through school unscathed. No teen is immune to experiencing problems. The crucial question for educators and parents, then, is to what degree girls are adversely affected or even incapacitated by stress. Given how well they hide their pain, how can we assume that when they seem to be doing okay they are really doing okay? How can we know when teens' unhappiness with their activities, friends, or teachers; their struggle in a particular subject; or anxiety about their future is normal--and when we should be concerned? Which teens are at risk for full-blown crises?
Psychologists conducting research in the field of psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) may have some answers. According to a newly developed biopsychosocial model of health and well-being, unhealthy reactions to stress occur when life's demands overtax coping skills. Whether stress results in a lowered immune response, susceptibility to infection, or depression depends on mitigating factors such as mental outlook, optimism, and social support. Perhaps most interesting, the body's physiological responses to stress depend more on perceptions of inner resources than on actual coping ability. It is whether girls think they can manage--that is, self-confidence--that matters most.
This finding is consistent with clinical experience. Teens go into crisis when they believe their pressures are insurmountable. Whatever coping skills they have counted on in the past no longer seem to work for them. Some endure a traumatic event (for example, a parental separation or death), others a relatively minor incident (for example, a fight with a friend or a romantic breakup). But something tips the scales, or a bunch of little somethings converge at once: recovering from the flu, coming back to school after an extended absence, missing a social event, getting a bad grade, or ticking off a teacher. At some point, however, the teen in crisis reaches a critical threshold of what she can tolerate, exhausts her inner resources, and hits a wall. As a psychologist who has been evaluating and treating adolescents since 1977, I know this for sure: More and more, my colleagues and I are seeing this kind of fallout from a myriad of stressors. A psychologist friend who has been on staff for seventeen years at a large, regional high school recently told me, "By November of this year, we had more crises than during the entire school year last year." She is not alone. Guidance counselors from across the country are reporting a sharp increase in psychological crises among students and, as a result, an overwhelming use of school resources.
National statistics confirm these anecdotal data. Serious mental health problems are not only increasing, but also occurring earlier in childhood. Psychologist Jean Twenge, of Case Western Reserve University, found that normal children ages nine to seventeen are presenting more symptoms of anxiety today than those treated for psychiatric disorders fifty years ago. A study conducted at Yale New Haven Children's Hospital found that within a four-year period in the mid-1990s, pediatric psychiatric emergency room visits rose 59 percent. Obsessive-compulsive disorders among youth are also skyrocketing.
Many stressed-out girls are turning to risk-taking behaviors such as using substances and engaging in inappropriate sexual activity. As one school administrator told me, "Girls who have to do well in school are very dutiful on the surface. They're not going to violate the dress code, for example. But their interior lives are much more buried. They get into a lot of dreadful things. Girls can give you all the information about drugs and alcohol and sexual behaviors. But as soon as they get away from schools and parents, they just unload. Weekends are pretty wild around here."
Although these teens are often thought of as troubled or rebellious, their behavior is actually best understood as attempts at self medicating for anxiety and despair. This may explain a disturbing trend: For the first time ever, underage girls are using mind-numbing substances such as alcohol and tobacco at the same rate as boys.
Equally worrisome, these vulnerabilities to stress do not end with high school graduation. Ironically, with all the machinations of trying to get girls accepted into college, they are not doing as well once they get there.
The Higher Educational Research Institute at UCLA, for example, found that the emotional well-being of freshmen hit an all time low at the beginning of the 2001-2002 academic year, even before September 11, 2001. As an article on student wellness in the American Psychological Association's Monitor on Psychology described, "At campuses all across the country, more undergraduate and graduate students are reporting depression, substance use, eating disorders, learning disabilities, and, most common, problems adapting to college life." Indeed, a 2004 study of 47,200 college students conducted by the American College Health Association found that 45 percent reported feeling so depressed during the past school year that it was difficult for them to function.
In response, a new federal law was enacted in October 2004 to provide grants to universities across the country to enhance mental health services on campuses. In addition to traditional therapies, colleges have begun to offer stressed-out students a variety of services--from massages to dog cuddling to biofeedback to stress-free zones.
But we have to do our part as well. To send off teens to college well prepared, we have to encourage them to develop healthier attitudes about achievement and better strategies for coping with stress. Once again, girls need more help in these areas. The same UCLA study found that freshman coeds rated their sense of health and well-being lower than that of boys--and were twice as likely to report feeling frequently overwhelmed by everything they had to do.
By hiding their suffering, however, girls deprive themselves of potential understanding, reassurance, and support from adults. If they are not aware of their teen daughters' inner lives and true experiences, how can even the most loving mothers and fathers know how to help them? Similarly, if teachers have no idea what is causing a girl to disinvest from school or sabotage her own success, how can they best intervene?
From Stressed-Out Girls: Helping Them Thrive in the Age of Pressure by Roni Cohen-Sandler, Ph.D. Copyright © 2005. Used by arrangement with Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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