Perceptions of Criticism

In upper-middle-class settings, kids who have the gumption to defy certain rules achieve high status among their schoolmates. The freshman who can chug down a six-pack after a baseball game, the sophomore who has made it with many of the hottest girls—they command wide respect in the peer group.

But there are double standards based on gender. Particularly distressing are the double standards about physical appearance: Peers place an enormous emphasis on attractiveness among affluent girls. Across the board, the more attractive kids— boys or girls, rich or poor—are more likely to be most popular with their peers. But for girls of high socioeconomic status, the onus on being attractive is incredibly high. In our research, we have found that links between peer admiration andbeauty were almost twice as strong among affluent girls as compared with affluent boys, and also compared with inner-city girls and boys. Looking "like a scrub" is simply not acceptable for well-off young women.

The enormous pressures that girls face from the peer group are matched by the impossibly high demands from adults to succeed in domains that are traditionally male, such as academics and sports, and also in the "feminine" domains of caring and kindness. They must not only be highly accomplished but also polite and likable, and they are expected to master the competing demands without any display of visible effort. Daughters of the rich, therefore, strive for effortless perfection—which is not merely challenging to their well-being but ultimately soul-draining.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the girls are more troubled than the boys. They show greater problems across multiple domains. In general, girls and women show their upset in internalizing problems, such as depression and anxiety. Affluent girls, however, show serious symptoms also in the most typically male forms, by acting out—rule-breaking, delinquency, and alcohol and drug use. Today's girls are involved in cheating scandals. They drink and do drugs. They have eating disorders. They steal from parents and friends. They are overrepresented across all domains of maladjustment. They have it all.

By no means are boys immune; they too face gender-specific challenges as they negotiate the culture of affluence. Rich boys can be disturbingly preoccupied with gaining high power in the peer group, which becomes tied, by late adolescence, to grandstanding via money and sex. Through high school, social dominance is related to good looks, athletics, and the "cool" factor of substance use. In college it becomes more about wealth. Moneyed young men ("guys who drop a cool thousand on any given Friday") are most likely to achieve the ultimate alpha male stamp—being desired by many girls.

Striving ever harder to be at the top—or, in their vernacular, a "baller," one whose status in society has been earned by his possession of "game"—puts such boys at risk for limited compassion and kindness. They can have low capacity for tenderness in close relationships, high capacity for chauvinism and narcissism. In a recent study, we found that narcissistic exhibitionism scores among affluent boys at elite private schools were almost twice the average scores of a more diverse sample.

Now More Than Ever

Why is it that high socioeconomic status brings more risk for young people today than it once did? There have been major shifts in aspirations and cultural values toward materialism that can be especially pronounced among the affluent. In 1967, for example, 86 percent of college freshmen rated "developing a meaningful philosophy of life" as an essential life goal. In 2004, only 42 percent of freshmen agreed with them. Over that time, values such as "being well-off financially" and "attaining prestigious jobs" rose equivalently in importance. Again, aspiring for status is likely highest among youth in upper-middle-class communities.

Also, the ultimate goal of getting into a good college is decidedly more competitive today than it used to be. Among top-tier colleges, the number of applicants has doubled or tripled over the last five years.

Privileged adolescents tend to define being well-off relative to what they see in their own parents. But in today's economy, it is much more difficult to maintain one's parents' standard of living. As one high school student said, "I want to make what my dad does, so I must get into Wharton. By 30 or 35, I should be making at least a quarter of a million a year."

One of the most established facts of psychology is that people evaluate themselves by comparing themselves with others. Wealth is relative in that we adopt the standards of our own immediate contexts, comparing ourselves with those we see doing better than us. The phenomenon of relative deprivation thus becomes a psychological cost of life in the fast lane, surrounded by the extremely successful.

Among youth in high-achieving schools, students are constantly gauging where they stand relative to others in the intense competition for distinction. "We compare ourselves with each other all the time. We know who made the AP classes and who dropped out because they couldn't keep up," says a student. "And we know everyone's top choices of colleges. In my grade, two other athlete-scholars want to go to Duke; we never talk about it openly, but we're constantly weighing our own chances of beating them in getting in."

Enter envy. My colleagues and I recently found that, compared to inner-city counterparts, students at elite, upper-middle-class schools, especially girls, experienced significantly more envy of peers who they felt surpassed them in popularity, attractiveness, academics, and sports.

At the same time, the intense push for superachievement deprives affluent adolescents of one of the critical safety valves of life—the deep social connectedness of friendship. The very path they take for success inhibits the development of intimacy. The durability, sustainability, and strength of relationships are constantly threatened by competition for highly sought-after goals. There's only one valedictorian. How can two people be friends if the self-worth of both depends on being the one chosen for a sought-after goal? One's gain is the other's loss.

Friendships are threatened also by the lack of leisure activities engaged in simply for fun and without a scrutinizing adult audience. Children today play sports watched by parents who are often much more invested in team wins than are the children themselves. Individual players' slip-ups are very public, bringing chagrin if not outright shame.

The pursuit of distinction leaves affluent adolescents with days that are heavily scheduled with academic and extracurricular activities. And while my studies show that extensive time in extracurricular activities is not a risk factor in itself—a sense of pressure, criticism, and overly high expectations from adults matter far more—participation restricts socializing to students in the same activities. Further, the constant competition, along with the necessity to display effortless perfection, demands that students show no vulnerabilities. Secrecy about weaknesses inhibits intimacy and further isolates them in their suffering.

Yet another contribution to vulnerability may be an inflated sense of control over one's life. As my colleague Barry Schwartz has shown, affluence leads people to believe they are wholly responsible for their own success. The wealthier people become, the more they believe that they can control many aspects of their life and design exactly the kind of life they want. They come to expect perfection.

Parents' overestimation of what they can actually control is reflected in the illusions harbored by their accomplished children—that one more point on the GPA, one more achievement, will push them over the edge to success, acceptance to a top-ranked college. The fallout? Any "failure" on any of these fronts can bring a rush of self-blame, shame, and depression.

Tomorrow's Leaders

Why should we care about the problems of rich kids? Most important, because no child should be left behind, regardless of parental education or income. Any young person who remains in anguish deserves and needs adult intervention. Minimizing the problems of rich kids is as ill-founded as accepting death by guns as just what happens to inner-city youth.

Further, today's highly educated youths will disproportionately hold positions of power in the next generation. Their values will disproportionately shape norms in education, politics, and business.

The distress and substance use children are experiencing can have considerable long-term costs. At a personal level, depressive episodes during adolescence bring elevated risk for recurrent episodes later in life. Prolonged feelings of stress can affect not just psychological well-being but also physical health and productivity at work. At a societal level, people who are unhappy, with a fragile sense of self, can be more acquisitive than philanthropic, more focused on gaining more for themselves than on improving the lot of others.

The high levels of substance use can affect the developing brain, impair coping ability, and impede everyday functioning. How many will not mature out of adolescent alcohol and marijuana abuse? If students must have Adderall to maintain 4.0 GPAs, how will they manage when they have real jobs in high-pressure settings?

What Can We Do?

Putting a brake on the development of symptoms among ambitious youth is not easy; it will require changes at multiple levels, from systems of secondary and higher education to individual families. At high-achieving schools, the leadership needs to understand that the relentless pursuit of star status can powerfully thwart the well-being of students.

Parents can, and must, play a central role in mitigating pressures on children. They are, after all, the immediate buffers of the culture, with great power to help children remain grounded in a value system that emphasizes decency and kindness as much as getting ahead. The importance of this task is paralleled by its difficulty: It takes an enormous amount of strength to be a lone parental voice amidst a community crescendo of "Do More!"

For some highly educated adults, a sense of success as parents rests on the splendor of their children's accomplishments. That is not a healthy burden for them. Or for parents. In shaping the next generation, parents would do well to ponder: Prestige, power, privilege—at what price?

After this fruitful explanations, 

I felt that the reasons mentioned above were exactly my inner unexpressed reasons,

I remembered I out of control once and I told mommy

"Do you know you are giving me too huge pressure? Awhile want me keep long hair, awhile want me mix what friend, awhile want me find part time job, awhile expect this awhile expect that... I'm really tired !"

When I read this sentence, I think of my high school year and my current life,

"If students must have Adderall to maintain 4.0 GPAs, how will they manage when they have real jobs in high-pressure settings?"

I recognized the word of Adderall because I consumed the same thing when I was in high school year,

a brand of medicine to keep someone concentrated.

And now,

I'm consuming Quetiapine, a kind of anti-anxiety medication to keep someone to bed every night and have a good brand new morning to keep up her studies.

What about one day if I didn't have these pills any more?

How I gonna regulate my life without this constant thing?

My life will be such a mess without a proper regulation.

Yes! I believed money can buy everything,

money can buy a constant life,

I even heard of someone told me that her dad used to have caffeine addict,

when he didn't drink coffee a day, he can't work due to the caffeine addiction.

Her dad is a successful Millionaire in Kuala Lumpur,

on the other hand,

I feel there's nothing wrong to use money to buy a supplement as further 'investment',

if one day, I become a very successful businesswoman,

I will still continue my current drug to earn more money....