Jim Liebelt's Youth Culture Watch

Young Americans Have Highest Death Rate Among High Income Countries

A new study of adolescent health around the globe found the United States had the highest mortality rate for people ages 10-to-24 of any high-income country in the world.

The American kids were also No. 1 in pot-smoking, moving toward the top spot in boozing — all while still hitting the gym harder than their contemporaries in other wealthy nations.

Death on the wrong end of a gun or any other violent method is up to 20 times more likely in the U.S. than the other 27 wealthy nations, according to findings reported in The Lancet, a British medical journal.

Traffic accidents combined with the violent deaths boosted the U.S. to its undesired position atop the mortality charts, The Lancet wrote in a series of articles this week.

“The drinking patterns of USA adolescents are catching up with those in other (high-income countries),” The Lancet reported. One reason the American numbers are disturbing: Most of the domestic binge drinkers are too young to drink legally. While the U.S. drinking age is 21, the number is as low as 16 in other nations.

The numbers also indicated that U.S. kids ages 13-15 exercised more than their global counterparts in high-income countries. The boys were No. 1 and the girls No. 2 in the rankings.

Source: NY Daily News
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/hard-partying-young-americans-highest-death-rate-high-income-country-study-article-1.1067644

One in Four Babies Born to Unmarried Couples

A new study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that nearly one in four first-born babies, or 22 percent, are born to unmarried couples living together. The numbers jumped dramatically from 12 percent in 2002.

"More people are cohabitating and more people cohabitating are likely to have children," Gladys Martinez, lead author of the study, told ABCNews.com. "We were surprised by the numbers because it was quite a jump from such a short time, just 10 years ago."

The findings were based on data from more than 23,000 face-to-face interviews with American men and women ages 15 to 44. Men and women with lower education levels were more likely to have more children than people who attended college. Hispanic women were more likely to give birth at an earlier age and have more children than other races, as well.

Experts say a cultural acceptance of having children out-of-wedlock, along with the economic downturn, contribute to the dramatic jump in children born to unmarried couples who live together.

Source: ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/children-born-unwed-couples-rise/story?id=16125007#.T47fR-3lPZG

Proms Get Pricey

Prom is the new wedding, and spending on the springtime high school dance is climbing within reach of celebrations of holy matrimony.

This year, families with teens are expected to spend an average of $1,078 on prom, up from $807 last year, according to data from a survey released by Visa that includes results based on a thousand telephone interviews conducted at the end of last month.

Spending has been driven to never-before-seen levels as teens are influenced by everything from celebrities and reality TV to the prevalence of social media, experts say.

Linda Korman, advertising director for Seventeen Prom and Teen Prom, says teen girls view prom as their "red-carpet moment" and are "heavily influenced" by celebrities who walk actual red carpets in designer gowns. "It's a rite of passage, and there's a legacy of how you look at your prom," she says. "Girls want to dress to impress."

With more adults marrying later, in many ways, prom has replaced weddings, debutante balls and coming-out parties as the formal occasion of a young adult's life, says Kit Yarrow, a marketing and psychology professor who co-authored Gen BuY, a book on Gen Y buying behavior.

This is especially evident in the Northeast and South, which have a tradition of formal coming-of-age parties. Average spending by families with teens attending prom is considerably higher than in other parts of the country, with families in the South expected to spend about $1,047, while Northeastern families will spend an average of almost $2,000, according to the Visa survey. In the West and Midwest, families will spend an average of $744 and $696, respectively, the survey found.

Source: USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/story/2012-04-12/high-school-prom-spending/54224068/1

Doctors See "Cinnamon Challenge" as a Recipe for Disaster

It is known as “the cinnamon challenge.’’ You try to swallow a spoonful of cinnamon without drinking water - or vomiting - preferably as a video camera is rolling. It may sound like silly fun, but health professionals and a growing number of local school systems are warning parents that the practice can cause health problems including respiratory distress and choking.

The YouTube generation finds the trend hilarious. How else to explain the more than 10.9 million hits for a video of a woman with big gold earrings spewing cinnamon after a failed attempt? Or the 30,000 cinnamon-related videos on the website? The challenge has been around for years, but a video posted by two NBA players, and the growth of social media and camera-enabled smart phones, have sent it viral in recent months.

Doctors aren’t laughing. They say the practice can cause serious injuries.

“The biggest problem is that the powder dries your mouth and throat, which makes it easier for it to enter your lungs instead of your stomach,’’ said James Mojica, a pulmonologist at Massachusetts General Hospital.That, in turn, can inflame the lungs, and lead to breathing difficulties, an acute lung injury, an aspiration pneumonia, or lung scarring.

Youths - the very people most commonly ingesting the cinnamon - are at particular risk, Mojica said. “Young patients can generate such high pressure when they cough that their lungs can collapse.’’

Source: Boston.com
http://articles.boston.com/2012-03-24/community/31234565_1_cinnamon-lungs-challenge

Here Comes "The Hunger Games"

With so much breathless anticipation awaiting the release of The Hunger Games this Friday, lost in the shuffle may be whether the film, based on Suzanne Collins’ wildly popular young-adult novel, is actually appropriate for young adults. The core story, after all, is 24 teenage kids literally killing each other as a brutal national television spectacle.

Yet, the movie only gets a PG-13 rating. Great for the boxoffice, but maybe not for the kids. So, what's a parent to do?

Common Sense Media, the independent, not-for-profit, non-partisan group that has been rating films’ appropriateness since 2003, gives The Hunger Games a "Pause 13+." What's this mean? “When we rate something ‘pause,’ it’s really a know-your-kids situation,” said CSM managing editor Betsy Bozdech. “It’s iffy for the age, but some 13-year-olds may be able to handle it, and some may not. You need to know your kid and your family and take it from there. We all have vivid imaginations, that’s for sure, but it’s very different to see a kid spearing another one, breaking another one’s neck, smashing their head in, than it is to read about it. It’s just a more visceral experience.”

For parents who allow their children to see The Hunger Games, Bozdech sees the film as a fabulous conversation starter for families.

Source: Inside Movies
http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/03/20/hunger-games-common-sense-media/

 

Sleep Deprivation and Teens - Walking Zombies

We just lost an hour of sleep by turning our clocks ahead for Daylight Savings Time. But imagine if you lost an hour of sleep — or even more — every night of your life. That’s what it’s like for our nation’s teens, who are facing an epidemic of sleep deprivation.

How bad is it? “Every single high school student I have ever measured in terms of their alertness is a walking zombie,” says Cornell sleep expert James Maas. It’s a description that will sound familiar to the parents of pretty much any teenager.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, American teenagers require about 9-1/4 hours of sleep a night, yet only 8 percent of them are getting it. A recent study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health found that as much as two-thirds of high school students get less than seven hours of sleep nightly.

If it was just a matter of early-morning fogginess this wouldn’t be a big deal, but sleep deprivation in teens has been linked to lower levels of Human Growth Hormone, which is integral to a teenager’s physical growth, brain development, and maturation of their immune system, as well as higher rates of anxiety disorders and depression. A 2010 study in the journal Sleep found that teenagers who go to bed after midnight are 24 percent more likely to suffer from depression and 20 percent more likely to consider harming themselves than those who go to bed before 10:00 p.m.

In a study of fourth and sixth graders conducted by sleep researcher Dr. Avi Sadeh at Tel Aviv University, a mere one-hour nightly loss of sleep was “equivalent to the loss of two years of cognitive maturation and development.” In other words, when deprived of just one hour of sleep each night, a sleep-deprived sixth-grader performed like a fourth grader. That’s not progress.

Not only is too little sleep affecting teens, but so is their means of staying awake. Many rely on coffee, caffeinated soda, and energy drinks. Some take Adderall or amphetamines. In Massachusetts and New York they can now stay up with the help of a lipstick-sized canister of inhalable caffeine. The Journal of Pediatrics recently concluded that energy drinks are “never appropriate for children or adolescents,” citing the harmful “neurologic and cardiovascular” impact of caffeine on teenagers.

Parents are encouraged to view sleep as essential to teenagers’ well-being and success by teaching them that sleep is as important as nutrition, exercise, studying, and free time.

Source: Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/sleep-deprivation-and-teens-walking-zombies/2012/03/10/gIQAr0QP3R_blog.html

Familes See Tablets As Playmate, Teacher, Babysitter

The rise of gadgets is ushering in a new generation of kids who are growing up digital. According to a Nielsen survey of adults with children under 12 in tablet-owning households, in the fourth quarter of 2011, seven out of every 10 children in tablet-owning households used a tablet computer – a nine percent increase compared to the third quarter of 2011.

Seventy-seven percent of those surveyed said children play downloaded games on their tablets and 57 percent said children used tablets to access educational apps. The portable gadget also keeps kids quiet while families are on-the-go: 55 percent and 41 percent of parents report that their children used tablets for entertainment while traveling or in restaurants, respectively. This can also include watching TV shows and movies, which 43 percent of children often do. Communicating with friends and family is a less popular function on tablets– only 15 percent of kids engage in this activity.

Source: Nielsen Co.
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/american-families-see-tablets-as-playmate-teacher-and-babysitter

Most U.S. Children Born Out of Wedlock

More than half of births to American women younger than 30 are outside marriage, research has found.

And across all ages, a staggering four in ten women are not married when they have children.

And with two-thirds of children in the U.S. born to mothers under the age of 30, it appears the majority of births across the country are out of wedlock.

The data was compiled by Child Trends, a Washington research group that analysed government data, and reported by the New York Times.

The paper reported that most college graduates marry before they have children, suggesting family structure is becoming a new class divide. "Marriage has become a luxury good," Frank Furstenberg, a sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania, told the Times.

The results carry concerning consequences, with researchers finding children born out of wedlock are more likely to struggle in school or suffer emotional and behavioral problems.

Source: Daily Mail
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2103235/Most-children-U-S-born-wedlock.html

Laptop Shooting Dad Says He'd Do It Again

Tommy Jordan, angry dad from North Carolina, became an overnight Internet folk hero for meting out gunslinging justice to his rebellious 15-year-old, who had recently posted a disrespectful update on her Facebook page.  On Thursday night, he posted the act of discipline on his daughter's Facebook wall, and on YouTube. By Monday morning, a stunning 21.4 million people had watched it -- far more than watch an episode of “American Idol”or even NBC's “Today” show.

While  experts interviewed by msnbc.com were highly critical of the public nature of the discipline, the vast majority of parents expressed enthusiastic approval for Jordan, most pointing out that it's high time "someone stood up to these spoiled kids."  An unscientific poll of 93,000 voters on Today.com found 74 percent agreed with Jordan's brand of discipline.

He was also visited by the police and Child Protective Services during the weekend. "Of course they came. They received enough ‘Oh my god he's going to kill his daughter’ comments that they had to," he wrote. He made light of the visits, however.  The police congratulated him, he said, and one officer added that he planned to use the video in presentations he does for the school system.

Despite the surprising notoriety, Jordan said he'd do it all over again in a statement designed to answer questions posed by reporters. “If I had it to do again... let's see... I'd do it almost the same," he wrote on his Facebook page in a note addressed to Anita Li of the Toronto Star. He wouldn't be smoking in the video, he said, then added, "I'd have worn my Silverbelly Stetson, not my Tilley hat, if I'd known that image was going to follow me the rest of my life and I'd probably have cleaned my boots. That's it."

"To answer 'Why did you reprimand her over a public medium like Facebook' my answer is this: Because that’s how I was raised. If I did something embarrassing to my parents in public (such as a grocery store) I got my tail tore up right there in front of God and everyone, right there in the store. I put the reprisal in exactly the same medium she did, in the exact same manner," Jordan wrote.

Source: MSNBC
http://redtape.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/13/10397269-laptop-shooting-dad-after-21-million-views-says-hed-do-it-over-again

 

Eight in Ten Teens Lie to Parents

In a survey released by the Josephson Institute of Ethics on the values and ethical actions of more than 40,000 high school students, the gap between what students believe and their actions does not bode well for future generations.

Survey highlights: While 89 percent of students believe that being a good person is more important than being rich, almost one in three boys and one in four girls admitted stealing from a store within the past year. Moreover, 21 percent admitted they stole something from a parent or other relative, and 18 percent admitted stealing from a friend.

On lying, more than two in five said they sometimes lie to save money (48 percent of males and 35 percent of females). While 92 percent of students believe their parents want them to do the right thing, more than eight in ten confessed they lied to a parent about something significant.

Rampant cheating in school continues. A majority of students (59 percent) admitted cheating on a test during the last year, with 34 percent doing it more than two times. One in three admitted they used the Internet to plagiarize an assignment.

Michael Josephson, president of the Institute and a national leader in ethics training, said the results of this survey, conducted in 2010, are slightly better than those of the 2008 survey.

Source: Josephson Institute
http://charactercounts.org/programs/reportcard/2010/installment02_report-card_honesty-integrity.html