We overprotect children in the real world and underprotect them online. It’s like sending them to Mars, with no protections. Play-based childhood has been replaced by phone-based childhood. The result — rates of suicide, anxiety, depression have skyrocketed among teen-agers, more among girls than boys, not only in the US, but Australia, even the Nordic countries. The cause isn’t worry about what climate change means for their future, or fears about their financial future, or even all the wars. Every generation has had similar worries. The cause of the mental health crisis is the merger in the early 2010s of smart phones with social media and video games — ‘the largest uncontrolled experiment humanity has ever performed on its own children.’ Haidt has the data and charts to back up his alarming conclusions. The Anxious Generation should be — nee, must be — read by every parent, every educator. By EVERYONE of us who wants to understand ‘the most rapid rewiring of human relationships . . .in human history,’ and why it is harder to care about others and build close relationships.