The high rate of maladjustment among affluent adolescents is strikingly counter-intuitive. There is a tacit assumption – even among those most affected – that education and money procure well-being, and that if children falter, they will swiftly get the appropriate services. Education and money may once have served as buffers against distress, but that is no longer the case. Something fundamental has changed: the evidence suggests that the privileged young are much more vulnerable today than in previous generations.

The evidence all points to one cause underlying the different disturbances documented: pressure for high-octane achievement. The children of affluent parents expect to excel at school, in multiple extracurricular activities and in their social lives. They feel a relentless sense of pressure that plays out in excessive substance use; as the kids stoutly proclaim, ”We work hard – and we play hard!” It plays out in crippling anxiety and depression, about anticipated or perceived ”failures”. It plays out in random acts of delinquency – stealing from a friend, shoplifting, defacing property.

It’s true, the pressure to do well in school and get into a prestigious university is shared by many teens. But maintaining the mantle of success is a special imperative for the well-off, for whom expectations are especially high. Adolescents of affluence want to meet the standard of living they are used to.

What’s more, achievement of their extremely lofty goals is tantalisingly within reach, which renders it all the more obligatory. There are few accomplishments that privilege can’t bolster, whether it’s improved test scores or squash skills, and affluent parents acquire whatever coaching is necessary to achieve the very best. The life credo of these youths becomes, ”I can, therefore, I must.”

– Suniya Luthar

via The rich kids are not all right.