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[Kagus]

However, the *circumstances* of your upbringing can result in the unhealthy coping and processing mechanisms that can develop into a mental illness.

Remember that mental illness isn't a binary definition of "either you have it or you don't". It's a term used for conditions that have gotten to the point of being damaging and disruptive to a person's everyday life. "Everyone has a mental health", as the phrase goes, and a number of factors can lead to that health deteriorating. Definitely including external factors.

That said,

You have to account for better detection rates.

A lot of this. Plus more standardized definitions that collect things under a particular name or banner instead of letting every observer use their own term on it. "If we don't test for COVID, we won't have any more cases!"


But as an addendum, the advent of social media hasn't exactly *helped* matters all that much 

[feelotraveller]

What is it about the modern world that leads to so many mental illnesses? I’ve seen it countless times and it seems to fly in the face of all the very real progress that has been made over the past century. I suspect the breakdown of community-level organisations has played some part in this, but I can’t help but feel there’s more to it than this.

However, the *circumstances* of your upbringing can result in the unhealthy coping and processing mechanisms that can develop into a mental illness.

Remember that mental illness isn't a binary definition of "either you have it or you don't". It's a term used for conditions that have gotten to the point of being damaging and disruptive to a person's everyday life. "Everyone has a mental health", as the phrase goes, and a number of factors can lead to that health deteriorating. Definitely including external factors.

An interesting data point https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(19)30934-1/fulltext

We estimated that approximately one in five people in post-conflict settings has depression, anxiety disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia. This finding is in contrast to data from GBD 2016,
which suggest a mean global prevalence of one in 14.

So that's almost 3 times more mental illnesses in post-conflict settings.  So there is clearly a strong environmental factor in play.

(Personally I muse about the impact of making a media spectacle of a couple of Iraq invasions... but musing it must remain.)

[Duuvian]

Lancet article is interesting but very long.

I poked through it to see if they took into account funding and mental health programs changes in availability pre-and post conflict.

unfortunately TLDR in detail

I have no reason to doubt their conclusion as it is quite logical but my first thought was wondering what impact accessibility to mental healthcare would have on the data; such as a sudden increase in accessibility post conflict as one would assume most governments would seek to increase funding and access, though to different degrees in different places and sadly that may not be the case always.

EDIT: I searched the page for 'funding' and this suggests they may have compared pre- and post accessibility and funding though it doesn't say explicitly:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Evidence for building systems for mental health care after conflict shows that emergencies, which can generate political interest and funding for mental health, can be a catalyst for the meaningful development of mental health care.3
A review of lessons learned from such work in ten countries showed that focusing on system-wide reform to address both new-onset and pre-existing mental disorders is crucial.3
Practical guidance for management of disorders that should be scaled up in conflict-affected countries already exists. WHO and UN High Commissioner for Refugees have designed the mhGAP Humanitarian Intervention Guide,14
which addresses the assessment and management of moderate and severe mental disorders in non-specialised health-care settings, such as general hospitals and primary health care. Moreover, a variety of packages designed to address multiple mental disorders, such as Problem Management Plus, Common Elements Treatment Approach and Self-Help Plus, have been used with promising results among conflict-affected Pakistanis, Burmese refugees, and South Sudanese refugees.40
,  41
,  42
It should be noted that there is wide consensus that mental health and psychosocial support for affected populations should go beyond psychological and medical treatments for mental disorders, and that such support should include psychosocial intervention that strengthens community self-help and support13
and advocacy for security and protection and for adequate humanitarian aid, including basic health services and livelihood support.

Did you see a mention of accessibility pre- and post conflict being factored in? Though to be fair the article is to present data not to explain why the data is such due to such variables.

[feelotraveller]

...my first thought was wondering what impact accessibility to mental healthcare would have on the data...
Did you see a mention of accessibility pre- and post conflict being factored in? Though to be fair the article is to present data not to explain why the data is such due to such variables.

No I don't think that they explicitly addressed that issue.  And it's fair enough to think about what the ongoing impact of a lack of adequate mental health services is.  [Edit: = you make a good point.]

The general point about traumatic events causing a statistical increase in problems of mental health has also been documented in the case of natural disasters where the reduction in mental health services has happened more or less instantaneously.  Studies about the difference of the prevalence of mental health problems with regard to varying levels of access to mental health services - since some parts of the world provide a lot more than others - would also be relevant.  These would be good starting points for looking at the influence of the accessiblity factor.

[MrRoboto75]

What is it about the modern world that leads to so many mental illnesses?

A bleak future.  The economy keeps crashing, wealth disparity keeps growing and the middle class shrinks.  Vast amounts of people barely getting by paycheck-to-paycheck.  Automation making jobs irrelevant without a safety net for the unemployed.  Destruction via climate change seems inevitable as people in power continue to do nothing.  Corporations continue to have growing control of government.  The current generation is near guaranteed to be worse off than their progenitors.

A lot of people are deciding not to have children since they think there won't be a world for them.

[Rolan7]

Reminds me of some old strategy games, like the original Galactic Civilizations, where population growth was tied to "happiness" (almost directly a function of economic prosperity).  I wouldn't inflict this world on anyone, much less an innocent child.  More productively, I'd prefer to focus on helping the people who are already here.

[McTraveller]

Things that make me upset, but not enough to do anything about:  "one time fees" from various companies *cough* Verizon *cough* when you make a change to your account.  My wife insisted on getting a new phone, like she always does the second her contract is up, and there are over $100 of "one time fees" associated with updates to our account.  WTF Verizon, you already got her to buy a new phone and go to a higher-tier plan with more money every month, and yet you need an extra $100 to take four seconds to update some database somewhere to say our two lines are in different plans now.

Yes I'm pining for "simpler times", now get off my lawn!

[Yoink]

Watching The Pacific. It's pretty great, but I just paused it to do a quick google search to check if a certain character was actually the inventor of the thing he'd just demonstrated, only for my stupid speed-reading eyes to travel over some irrelevant info on the page, leading to a pretty significant spoiler.   
Ugh. I should know better by now.    

[martinuzz]

I am mildly upset at worldwide scientific funding.
Can people just not stop with spending billions on completely unimportant matters like settling the moon or curing Covid,and put some funding into really important things,

like,
WHERE DO MY SOCKS GO? I found out I currently have 20 what-used-to-be pairs-but-are-now-single-socks.

[MaxTheFox]

I don't want children TBH. Too much responsibility.

And definitely not until I leave Russia.

[hector13]

I am mildly upset at worldwide scientific funding.
Can people just not stop with spending billions on completely unimportant matters like settling the moon or curing Covid,and put some funding into really important things,

like,
WHERE DO MY SOCKS GO? I found out I currently have 20 what-used-to-be pairs-but-are-now-single-socks.

Why tf do you have 20 pairs of socks?

[Naturegirl1999]

I have more than that, since I don’t grow very much, and also how socks just go missing

[The_Explorer]

I hate my parents touching my ant stuff (I keep ants) and randomly putting it in boxes. They are starting to pack things up, but that should be my thing to do with my own stuff

So annoying

[martinuzz]

Switch to fire ants or bullet ants, maybe they will learn not to touch them.

[The_Explorer]

Switch to fire ants or bullet ants, maybe they will learn not to touch them.

Its just ant supplies and an empty ant farm. But I need to use the ant farm soon for my quickly growing ant colony, and need to clean it before hand (which is going to take a long time). If it had ants in it, I'd have kept the ant farm somewhere else. They also wouldn't have touched it if it had ants in it.