[onion2k]

We haven't had an explosion in mental illness. We've had an explosion in the number of people being able to recognize they have an issue, understand that help is available, and being willing to speak about it publicly. The problems have always been there.

[poniko]

I don't believe that to be true, mental health amongst teens has had a rapid decline in the past 10ish years, social media and always connected seems to be a major part of that.

[zweiasakura]

The truth includes both the other comments to this reply: modern science has given us more insight into our long standing problems (and some solutions too), but also technology that can be detrimental to our mental health. Yes it's true that both a poison and its antidote can be drunk from a cup. But people might be aversive to the cup they drank the poison from, even if it now contains the antidote. And to think the cup is the only way to administer the antidote may exclude a lot of people who might other benefit from the service

[bumby]

"Rates of teenage depression began to rise around 2012, when adolescent use of social media became common"[1]

It's not clear to me that there's a mechanism to link this to the higher rate of diagnosis hypothesis. The authors instead link it to social media.

[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00296-x

[romeros]

exactly.. in the luddite era dyslexia wasn't recognized and people assumed you were dumb. Likewise in the 70s and 80s ADHD/Depression/Anxiety etc were thought to be harmless and associated with "laziness/bad parenting" etc.

Now, we are more intelligent and the average person knows better than to downplay mental health challenges.