#29 Are College Students Too Emotionally Fragile? Hara Marano: How Do We Fix It?

From angry scenes over Halloween costumes at Yale to protests against racism at the University of Missouri, student activism is back. More than at any time since the late 1960's, America is in the middle of a wave of college unrest.

To what extent do students today have genuine grievances? Are at least some of them rebels without a cause - angry because their feelings have been hurt?

“Step by step colleges are being transformed into something more akin to mental health wards rather than citadels of learning,” says our guest, Hara Marano, Editor at Large of Psychology Today and author of the book, "A Nation of Wimps".

While calls for greater diversity among college professors are an important cause, Marano tells us of fundamental changes in the student population.

"Rising numbers of students are breaking down with anxiety and depression, self-mutilation, burning, cutting, binge drinking to obliterate all of their anxiety," says Marano. "Even the slightest disappointment pitches them into crisis mode."

"The American College Mental Health Association has been documented rises in all of these conditions." Many students "get so distressed so readily."

Are many young people over-protected and even narcissistic, demanding protection from ideas and concepts they find too uncomfortable to listen to? This episode digs into these questions, suggesting fixes for colleges and parents.

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