Headline Or Hoax? with Dr Brian and Dr John Delony

A headline says certain childhood traumas are linked to fewer mental health problems in adolescence and our brains immediately split in two: curiosity and alarm. We start with a quick round of “Headline Or Hoax,” then unpack why a clean, counterintuitive claim can be both interesting and easy to misuse, especially when it gets reduced to a clickable takeaway instead of a careful conversation about data, definitions, and outcomes.

We dig into the idea that adaptation isn’t healing. Sometimes what looks like resilience is really masking, suppression, or a survival strategy that pays off in the short term. We talk about how achievement can function as a trauma response, why outliers don’t prove the rule, and what we wish researchers and journalists would clarify when they talk about childhood trauma, poverty, community threat, coping mechanisms, and adolescent mental health.

Then we pivot to the “undiagnosed” trend on social media and the growing hunger for a label. Awareness can be good, but misinformation is everywhere, and diagnoses in the DSM are symptom clusters, not a full identity. We wrestle with the risk of turning a diagnosis into a pair of glasses you can’t take off, and we land on a practical frame we keep coming back to: make it context, not an excuse.

If you care about mental health literacy, trauma nuance, and the real-world impact of self-diagnosis online, listen through and join the conversation. Subscribe, share this with a friend who loves a good headline, and leave a review with your take: when does a label help and when does it hold us back?

SOURCES:

HEADLINE #1: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2825281

HEADLINE #2: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-human-algorithm/202503/tiktok-therapy-how-gen-zs-trend-is-reshaping-mental-health

THANKS TO OUR GUESTS:

Dr Brian: child and adolescent psychiatric medicine

IG: @raisingadhd_org

https://raisingadhd.org/

Dr John Delony: mental health expert/counselor, comedian

IG/FB/TT/YT @johndelony

www.johndelony.com

Subscribe wherever you listen, share this with a friend and leave a review so more people can find honest conversations about healthcare and a little comedy along the way.

This episode was produced by Angie Debelak with post-production editing by Ben Hill Sound.

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Transcript

Headline Or Hoax Setup

Dr Ben 0:10

All right, knock knock howdy, folks. Dr. Ben here alongside Dr. John, Dr. Brian. Are y'all ready for the segment Headline or Hoax? Let's do it. Yeah. Alright, I'm gonna read two statements. One's an actual real headline and one is a hoax. And you two are going to determine which one is the headline. Now, previously we've had uh guess both guests the correct one, both guess the incorrect one, and then split decision. Oh, so we write down hoax or real? Uh which one's real. Okay. Which one's real? Put your name at the top here. And I'm gonna read two headlines. And we're gonna see which one's a real headline, which one's a hoax. Listener, are you ready at home? All right, folks. The first headline is certain childhood traumas are linked to fewer mental health problems in adolescence. Certain childhood traumas are linked to fewer mental health problems in adolescence. That's headline number one. And then headline number two is undiagnosed trend linked to 30% rise in emergency room visits as patients ignore symptoms until crisis. The undiagnosed trend linked to 30% rise in emergency room visits as patients ignore symptoms until crisis. Alright, we'll give listener and you guys time to deliberate and debate and go with your gut, your brain. Alright, we're gonna see which one's a real headline, which one's a hoax.

The Reveal And A Surprising Study

Dr Ben 1:48

All right, we're ready for the big reveal, and we're gonna show the camera here. Uh, Dr. Brian, which one is a real headline?

Dr Brian 1:55

Go with number two.

Dr Ben 1:56

Number two, the undiagnosed trend. We're gonna talk about that. And Dr.

Dr John 1:59

John, undiagnosed trend.

Dr Ben 2:02

All right. We have uh unanimous decision here that it's number two, the undiagnosed trend. We're gonna talk about what that is. Now, the uh real actual headline is drumroll number one. Certain childhood traumas are linked to fewer mental health problems in adolescence. And we might delve into that a little bit. Actually, in JAMA, they published that the in the adolescent brain cognitive study at a University of Wisconsin, up to 11,000 kids, they found that uh um uh certain external trauma like community threats and poverty um because of uh adaptation and resilience actually later on um uh was linked to fewer mental uh health problems in in adolescence, whether it be coping mechanisms. I have so many questions about that. Right. Now, I mean I'm sure there's yeah, a lot of questions that let's let's uh pose some questions.

Dr John 2:59

My question would be if so I hear a lot like you don't need to go to college, like look at Bill Gates and look at Steve Jobs, right? I'm like, okay, well, let's go into some of these other communities where there's hundreds of folks who are struggling, and I'm not saying everyone needs to go to college, right? But when you use an outside the bell curve norm to try to prove your point, then it's it's not it's not it's not it's being disingenuous with the with the data in front of you. And so my first question to this, to those research teams would be yes, there are folks who grow up in abject poverty who are able to, or with any any number of traumas, who are able to navigate the world and the resilience, their operating strategy to survive is rewarded in the environment that they live in, right? So I can work 20 hours, I can I I had I had a supervisor once say, John, you know, straight A's can be a trauma response to like a kid who is getting beat up at home knows nobody hits me if I get straight A's. I'm gonna get straight A's. And so just because they're able to get through like undergrad and law school and then go to med school and get perfect scores and then go get make partner doesn't mean they're well. That means they just are winning in this weird scorecard that we dropped. So that would be like,

When Adaptation Gets Misread

Dr John 4:20

I would want to know are there 80% of the those kids that didn't do well, but 20% of them actually their adaptive strategy won out in the end. That'd be my question. What questions would you pose?

Dr Brian 4:31

Yeah, I mean, it's kind of like what are these traumas? Because if a kid considers going to school trauma, I mean, is that gonna count? Because it's like, I hate this, it gives me anxiety. Oh, sure.

Dr John 4:42

But like the kid getting to is the adolescent getting to name the traumatic experience. Yeah.

Dr Brian and Dr John 4:47

I mean, there's dad didn't give me a smartphone. Yeah, this is clearly traumatic, but then there's some that it's like, uh, you know. That's not trauma. Yeah, that's not trauma. That's like giving it good old hard work. Is that word overused trauma? Yeah, trauma. Yeah. I mean, it kind of means it's it's too broad.

Dr John 5:02

Yeah.

Dr Brian 5:03

Like we need a spectrum. Yeah, and people are using this for like the I mean, the worst event that could happen to a child, or you know, my my teacher gave me extra homework and it's traumatic to me. Trauma, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Dr Ben, Dr Brian, Dr John 5:19

Both sound very traumatic. All right. And then it's kind of amazing though, that stat. Like, I want to read that study. Can you send me that study? I want to see it. Yes, it's uh I I'll uh we'll give you the and we'll put the link in there.

Dr Brian 5:32

How do we use it? Do we need to like have a little more poverty? You know what I mean?

Dr John 5:35

Like my fear is when when I can't I I I feel like academic journals come out and then there's a whole move where the journalists want to be the first one to the scene and they just read the abstract and they come up with the most perverse way to explain that abstract so that they can get clicks on their thing. And so I would love to read that study. Let's get that and we could do a journal club on it, maybe.

Dr Ben and Dr John 6:01

But uh, one of the researchers like if you don't think this is nerdy though, journal club. Like journal clubs, but you're invited. Uh uh Dr. Russell was one of the uh um researchers, and uh he did say adaptation isn't healing, so there's adaptation suppression, and so bottling up your feelings to survive. Um and uh and maybe they just had the mental um uh problems earlier before adolescence too. Maybe they peaked with their uh uh mental problems before. So I wouldn't recommend childhood trauma on anybody.

Dr John 6:41

No, no matter how you express it, but that's just me.

Dr Ben 6:44

Okay. Um he did uh warn that uh don't call this resilience. Um uh it's probably just masking. It could be masking, so the brain is wired for survival.

Dr John 6:56

Yeah. That's what we were saying,

The Rise Of Self Diagnosis Online

Dr Ben 6:58

yeah. Um but uh JAMA psychiatry, I'll get you this January 2025. The JAMA article led by Dr. Russell, JAMA psychiatry. All right, and then let's talk about that undiagnosed or undiagnosis trend where in social media people are saying I have undiagnosed and so I think it does heighten awareness, but uh they also looked at that and said there's up to 83% of uh the mental health advice on social media is misleading or incorrect. So I think it's good it's raising awareness towards certain mental health issues.

Dr Brian 7:31

Yeah, I think there's also this like buy-in for a diagnosis that people want a diagnosis or it's somehow beneficial, but but like kind of like talked earlier with the DSM, these diagnoses are just a collection of symptoms. Like what what is the diagnosis?

Dr John 7:47

The the way diagnostics have been turned and used as an identity is to me is the most um frightening part of them because they're spoken, it it it becomes a uh a pair of glasses that you are handed that through which you see the world. I have this thing, and so this is and for bipolar one, for borderline personality disorder, for schizophrenia, like some of those, it's important. You need to wear those glasses because you experience the world different than others. But I think it can get everyone's I want a pair of glasses too. I was a kid, I wanted braces because every one of my friends had them. And my doctor or my the the dentist was like, Your teeth are straight, man. You don't ever need them. And I remember being sad about that in fourth grade.

Dr Ben 8:37

I was like that with glasses. My whole family had glasses, and I was like, I want glasses.

Dr John 8:40

Yeah, I want glasses. Yeah, and so you want we're social creatures, right? We want to, and if everybody has this label that they get to enter into the room first with, I I I I want to socially norm myself, I want that too. And I think that's man, that's not good.

Dr Ben 8:56

Yeah. And uh people might want that to use as a crutch too, to blame, well, I can't overcome this because I have this, or we're all looking for excuses.

Dr Brian 9:08

Yeah, I mean, there's not a mental health disorder that gets you like really ahead in life. So I mean, saying, Oh, I'm ADHD, your boss isn't gonna be like, oh, I didn't know you

Context Not Excuse Mindset

Dr Brian 9:18

were ADHD. Here's an extra bonus and time off and promotion. And like once you hit adulthood, it kind of just all fades away.

Dr John 9:25

And well, and I like to always I used to tell my students, like especially my college students, this has to become a context for you, not an excuse. Like this is a this is a way your body tries to handle stress, trauma, whatever. You still gotta be this paper, still has to be turned out on Friday. And so the the the figuring out to navigate the world for you is given this set of circumstances, and it's the same as they would tell Muggsy Bogues, the great basketball player who was five, six, or if like those guys are all 10 feet, so you have to figure out how to score or how to pass if you want to get on that court. And I don't know, man. That's that that's a whole other conversation. But I feel like I can't think of something more disempowering. And I think it came from a good spirit of we want to give all these young people the resources they need and the care they need. And does it really matter if they get this test done in an hour or two hours to find out if they learned something? No, like we double down on some of these system stuff, but in a weird way, it's become incredibly disempowering because you've told a generation of person you are somehow broken. There's something wrong with you. And so you go in the corner, we'll clear the deck for you. And then eventually that run, instead of walking alongside saying, Okay, you gotta you're five. We gotta get you on that court. So you're gonna have to really work hard over here. Um, I I and that to me is empowering, not just go to the side and we'll take care of it for you. Is that what I'm watching him on 100% NBA? Oh, he's he's magic. He, but he had to be, right?

Dr Ben and Dr John 10:52

Right? He had to be, and I love that. Or when Spud Webb won the dunk contest or man, yeah, it's amazing five seven or interview.

Dr John 10:59

Yeah, yeah.

Dr Ben 11:00

So all right.