Faces

I read this morning news of research published today by the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons showing that teenagers who suffer acne are more likely to have suicidal thoughts and attempt suicide. I must say I wasn't surprised. A person's face is one of their most important tools for communication, and to be constantly conscious of what feels like facial disfigurement, however trivial it might seem to some people, must greatly add to the burden of depression that so many teenagers undergo.

This evening I came across this article in the Guardian. It's quite long, but I found it very informative, and moving. It's about a British plastic surgeon (craniofacial surgeon) and the charity work he carries operating on children with severe facial deformities. Some of the children had suffered psychological trauma and depression as a result of their treatment by their peers.

"It's been very clearly demonstrated in psychological studies," says Kelly, "that there is an almost knee-jerk interpretation, and assumption, that behind the mask of facial difference there must be a child who is less intelligent, less kind, less receptive, less likely to progress. And the child feels this rejection and faced with it from all sides, will tend to internalise it. And it tends to produce in the child a feeling they're incompetent, that they can't cope, can't be good. Another thing that happens is that their physical deformity tends to paralyse their physical possibilities in their minds, and they feel physically impaired - that they can't play football, for example - whereas in fact, of course, they can. It's very restrictive.

More on the same charity from the BBC site.