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Changes in family structure and culture may play a larger role in child mental health than we acknowledge.

The rise of mental health conditions might in part be a byproduct of stressed, overworked, isolated families.

Nonwestern, more traditional parenting relied on community, contribution, and calm authority.

What if the problem isn't inside the child, but changes we've made in the world surrounding them?

We are in the midst of a childhood mental health epidemic, and one thing is clear: Our children are suffering.

The causes of the epidemic are multiple and varied. For example, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt (2024) has argued convincingly that smartphones and social media have taken a toll on children’s well-being.

The Impact of Shifting Parenting Practices Over Time

Another factor, however, deserves attention: the possibility that in less than a century, modern Western families have drifted away from parenting practices that existed for millennia, which likely helped children become more cooperative, emotionally stable, and resilient.

Journalist Michaeleen Doucleff explored this question in her book Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us About the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans, where she spent time with Maya, Inuit, and Hadzabe families and contrasted their child-rearing practices with modern Western norms (Doucleff, 2021).

This article considers how her core insights may intersect with the mental health epidemic: whether some portion of the epidemic is caused by a mismatch between children’s needs and modern family life.

Doucleff argues that traditional families often rely on a different parenting structure: Children are embedded in a wider network of extended family, older children are expected to contribute to household life, and adults tend to guide with calm, confident authority rather than constant verbal correction or child-centered negotiation. Instead of organizing family life around a child’s feelings and preferences, these communities gradually draw children into the shared work and rhythms of daily life.

As well, Nikhil Chaudhary and Annie Swanepoel (2023) suggest........

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