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The Mental Health of Teenage Girls: Causes, Challenges, and Support
Wednesday, February 25, 2026 @ 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm EST
Presented by Cat Bohannon, Ph.D., Researcher and Author, Columbia University; Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Author of Girls on the Brink: Helping Our Daughters Thrive in an Era of Increased Anxiety, Depression, and Social Media; and Carla Sosenko, Journalist and Author
Sponsored by Penguin Random House Education
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Teenage girls are facing a significant mental health crisis, marked by alarming increases in feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and suicidal ideation. This crisis stems from a complex mix of evolutionary and environmental factors, including hormonal changes during puberty, social media pressures, academic stress, and societal expectations. Recognizing these challenges is essential to early intervention, open communication, and access to appropriate mental health resources.
In this edWebinar, authors Cat Bohannon, Ph.D., and Donna Jackson Nakazawa, in conversation with Carla Sosenko, explore how mental health impacts student success both in and out of the classroom. They offer practical tools and strategies to support educators’ professional growth and help them respond effectively to this ongoing crisis.
The session aims to provide guiding resources that support educators and promote healthy development, resilience, and successful learning. This recorded edWebinar is of interest to middle and high school teachers, school leaders, district leaders, school counselors, and any educator concerned with adolescent girls’ health and well-being.
About the Presenters
Dr. Cat Bohannon is a researcher and author with a Ph.D. from Columbia University in the evolution of narrative and cognition. Her essays and poems have appeared in Scientific American, Mind, Science Magazine, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, The Georgia Review, The Story Collider, and Poets Against the War. She lives with her family in Seattle.
Donna Jackson Nakazawa is the author of five books that explore the intersection of neurobiology and emotion, including Girls on the Brink, named a best book of 2022 by The Washington Post; The Angel and the Assassin, named a best book of 2020 by Wired; and Childhood Disrupted. Her upcoming book, Mind Drama: The Science of Rumination and How to Outwit Your Inner Defeatist, will be published in May 2026. Her work has appeared in Wired, Stat, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, Health Affairs, and Parenting, and has been featured on the cover of Parade and in Time; she has appeared on Today, NPR, NBC News, and ABC News. Donna is also the creator of the narrative writing-to-heal program Breaking Free from Trauma. She is a regular speaker at universities and organizations, including the Child Mind Institute, Children’s Hospitals, the Harvard Division of Science, Johns Hopkins, and Rutgers.
Carla Sosenko is a journalist and author whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Marie Claire, and other publications. She has been a staffer at Life & Style Weekly, Time Out New York, Entertainment Weekly, Newsweek, and Us Weekly. Her memoir, I’ll Look So Hot in a Coffin, was published by The Dial Press in 2025; she also co-wrote TikTok star Melissa Dilkes Pateras’s first book, A Dirty Guide to a Clean Home. Carla graduated from Boston University with a BA in English and a BS in journalism, and she has an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College.
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