when greater awareness of mental illness leads people to talk of normal life struggles in terms of “symptoms” and “diagnoses.” These sorts of labels begin to dictate how people view themselves, in ways that can become self-fulfilling.

Teenagers, who are still developing their identities, are especially prone to take psychological labels to heart. Instead of “I am nervous about X,” a teenager might say, “I can’t do X because I have anxiety” — a reframing that research shows undermines resilience by encouraging people to view everyday challenges as insurmountable.

It’s generally a sign of progress when diagnoses that were once whispered in shameful secrecy enter our everyday vocabulary and shed their stigma. But especially online, where therapy “influencers” flood social media feeds with content about trauma, panic attacks and personality disorders, greater awareness of mental health problems risks encouraging self-diagnosis and the pathologizing of commonplace emotions — what Dr. Foulkes calls “problems of living.” When teenagers gravitate toward such content on their social media feeds, algorithms serve them more of it, intensifying the feedback loop.