PARENTAL EXPECTATIONS: A DRIVING FORCE OR A BURDEN?
Journalist Jennifer Wallace wanted to understand why studies were showing elevated rates of anxiety, depression, and related issues among kids in “high-achieving” schools—a topic she wrote on for The Washington Postopens in 2019. To learn more, she teamed up with researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education to create a survey, which she distributed online to parents through her social networks in February 2020. When she sent it out, she asked recipients to share it with their networks. The goal was to collect 1,000 responses. Within days, there were 6,500.
The pressure to succeed, the parents’ answers suggested, was contributing to a mental health crisis among young people in the United States, and parents were suffering, too. Among the survey’s findings, Wallace said, 73% of respondents agreed that parents in their community believed getting into a selective college is one of the most important ingredients to later life success. Eighty-three percent agreed that their children’s academic success is a reflection of their parenting. Yet 87% wished that childhood was less stressful for their kids.
Although the desire to succeed is often a positive motivator, too much pressure to get into a good college, get ahead at work, or fit into an unrealistic mold of perfection can be detrimental to mental health, psychological studies indicate. And, according to a growing body of psychological research, those pressures are growing.
But not everybody succumbs to this kind of “toxic achievement culture,” and a new wave of studies is zeroing in on a concept known as mattering that can be protective by providing people with a sense of self-worth independent of their accomplishments. Drawing attention to the issues is an important first step, researchers say.
Growing pressures
Over the past few decades, growing competition and individualism have made life increasingly difficult for young people. These cultural shifts have intensified the pressure to achieve and be perfect, leaving many feeling inadequate no matter how much they accomplish.
A large-scale analysis of over 41,000 college students across three countries found that all three forms of perfectionism increased between 1989 and 2017, with socially prescribed perfectionism – the feeling that others expect you to be perfect – rising by 33%, more than triple the increase seen in self-oriented perfectionism. Ongoing research suggests these levels continue to climb.
Curran is working to update the research, and his new findings, which are still under analysis, suggest that levels of socially prescribed perfectionism continue to rise exponentially. “We’re also seeing concerns over mistakes, doubts about actions, things that are sort of corollaries to perfectionism that come with perfectionistic thinking,” he said. “They’re also rising really, really, really fast.”
Today, perfectionism affects an estimated 25 to 30 percent of children and adolescents, and the trend cuts across cultures and countries. Researchers and clinicians are increasingly identifying achievement culture as a key contributor to the mental health crisis in young people, alongside social media’s role in fuelling constant comparison.
The pressure to get into the right college, look a certain way, and meet ever-rising expectations has quietly become one of the more significant threats to young people’s wellbeing, not because ambition itself is harmful, but because the bar keeps moving and the cost of falling short keeps rising.
Too much of a good thing
When the drive to succeed becomes too intense, it stops being motivating and starts being harmful. Experts acknowledge that cultivating ambition is important, it provides purpose, meaning, and well-being. But when people feel they can never live up to expectations, the pursuit of perfection pulls them away from any genuine sense of self-worth.
The most concerning trend is socially prescribed perfectionism – the pressure that comes from feeling constantly judged and evaluated by others. Research spanning over three decades has linked this type of perfectionism to depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation, and it is the form rising most rapidly today. The problem is also broader than once assumed. While high-achieving, affluent communities were historically seen as the primary concern, research across nine high-achieving schools found rates of clinically significant anxiety and depression between six and seven times the national average, affecting students from a range of backgrounds, not just the privileged few.
Part of what drives this is the way achievement has seeped into every corner of young people’s lives. Even extracurricular activities have become resume-builders rather than genuine outlets, replacing supportive relationships with constant competition. The relentless pressure to outperform others does not just affect grades – it erodes self-esteem and isolates people from genuine human connection. As one researcher put it, perfectionism alienates people from themselves by pushing them to become someone perfect rather than someone real, and alienates them from others by turning peers into competitors. The result, quietly and persistently, is loneliness.
The roots of achievement culture
A variety of reasons might help explain a growing pressure to be perfect, studies suggest, including the importance of social media in many people’s lives. In a survey of nearly 2,000 Austrian, Belgian, Spanish, and South Korean 12- to 19-year-olds, for example, researchers found correlations between Instagram use and the internalization of professional, social, sexual, and romantic ideals. The study linked Facebook use with the internalization of social and romantic ideals. Both Facebook use and the internalization of sexual ideals were related to poor mental well-being, the study found (de Lenne, O., et al., Media Psychology, Vol.23, No. 1, 2020)
Beyond social media, college admissions pressure has intensified – acceptance rates at some selective schools have dropped below 5%, raising the stakes for everyone. Parents, driven by the same competitive culture, have responded by becoming more anxious and controlling, a parenting style that research links directly to higher rates of perfectionism in children. Across studies involving thousands of young people, those with more critical or high-expectation parents showed significantly more perfectionistic traits. At the core of all of it, researchers suggest, is a feeling that they simply do not matter enough and that points toward where the solution lies.
The case for mattering
The antidote to achievement pressure, researchers suggest, is a sense of mattering – feeling valued for who you are, not what you accomplish. Young people who feel they matter are more resilient, bouncing back from setbacks rather than being defined by them, and research links this feeling to lower rates of depression, anxiety, and loneliness. The flip side is equally telling: those who feel they do not matter often feel invisible, and the overlap between not mattering and loneliness compounds into what researchers describe as a doubly isolating experience.
And while perfectionism and mattering are closely related (one of the reasons people feel the need to be perfect is that they think they do not matter), feelings of not mattering may be more prevalent than perfectionism, Flett said. Certain people from marginalized groups based on socioeconomics, sexual orientation, and other factors are more prone to feel like they do not matter, and for some this may reflect life experiences.
The pressure to achieve is a systemic issue related to a capitalist society that emphasizes productivity over people, added Grace Kim, PhD, a clinical psychologist at Boston University who studies social justice education and the mental health of Asian Americans. Achievement culture can be particularly fraught for immigrants and people of color, who both are motivated to build a better future and must contend with racism and discrimination, she said. Her work with Asian American academics suggests that societal pressures can be exacerbated by expectations that they do more work to boost representation and fulfill a “model minority” stereotype.
Reducing pressure on marginalized groups in particular, she said, will require policy changes that stop pitting people against each other and instead build a sense of belonging that mirrors the idea of mattering. “If the culture or the structure is not changing, we’re always bumping against those kinds of messages,” she said. “I don’t think the individual-level solution is the way to go.”
Strategies to boost mattering
Building a sense of mattering requires practical, consistent effort from both adults and young people themselves. Researchers suggest several strategies:
1. Spend genuine, present time with children: Engaged, warm interactions where parents are fully attentive, rather than distracted by phones, communicate to children that they are worth someone’s full attention. The quality of presence matters more than the quantity.
2. Make love and approval unconditional: Praising only achievements and going quiet after failures teaches children their worth is performance-dependent. Consistent messages of care and recognition, regardless of outcomes, are what build lasting self-worth.
3. Normalize setbacks: Telling young people that failure is a normal part of being human, not a reflection of their value, reduces the fear of imperfection. Parents who model this openly make it easier for children to internalize it.
4. Limit social comparison: Young people need to understand that the internet is not an accurate reflection of reality. Helping them invest in a small circle of real relationships, rather than chasing approval from an unlimited online audience, is far more protective for mental health.
5. Encourage prosocial behavior: Volunteering, mentoring, or helping others consistently builds self-esteem and reduces anxiety. When young people use their abilities for others, they feel useful and appreciated in a way that achievement alone cannot replicate.
6. Adults need to tend to their own mattering too: Children’s resilience depends on the adults around them. Teachers and parents who prioritize their own wellbeing and sense of worth model the same for the young people in their care.
References
Mattering as a core need in children and adolescents: Theoretical, clinical, and research perspectivesopens in new window
Flett, G. L., APA, 2025
Never enough: When achievement culture becomes toxic—and what we can do about itopens in new window
Wallace, J. B., Portfolio, 2023
Youth in high-achieving schools: Challenges to mental health and directions for evidence-based interventionsopens in new window
Luthar, S. S., & Kumar, N. L. In Leschied, A. W., et al. (Eds.), Handbook of School-Based Mental Health Promotion, Springer, 2018
