Huang Jing, a psychologist, has watched her company grow recently.
As with any other sector, there would be reason to rejoice because China has prioritized private enterprise as it works to ensure a long-term economic recovery, but a rise in demand for mental health services has even greater, disturbing relevance.
Huang set up her first counseling business, Better Family, in Shanghai in February 2022– no longer before the town ‘s , famous two- quarter lockdown , began. When confinement was lifted in June, business immediately recovered, and yet three months later, her practice started to fail. Six weeks after that, she opened two more headquarters there.
Today, she has expanded to Shanghai, operating three agencies in the Yangtze Delta technology hub.
Even though Huang’s business is one of the most lucrative, the rapid expansion of the country’s economy and social development reflects a rise in problems like anxiety and depression among the populace, including the middle class, which are commonly believed to be the cause of the country’s economic growth and social development.
She said,” People ca n’t help but wonder why the Chinese economy is coming to a halt.” ” We’ve seen a sea change in the property market, disillusionment of young people, and, particularly, mountains of pressure from parents: To make money, save money, rigid education ( standards ) and dim outlooks for their children’s future”.
The World Health Organization has estimated 54 million persons in China , suffer from depression , and 41 million suffer from anxiety disorders. Health officials have also made efforts to address the problem in recent years.
According to statistics from Qcc.com, a business credit information provider, there have been threefold increases in the number of counseling organizations between 2011 and 2020 as a result of these events. The amount soared by more than 60 per share year on year in 2022, reaching 30, 700.
More than 160, 000 businesses in China had company information that included psychic counseling, according to the state-run paper Legal Daily, as of the end of last year.
” I studied philosophy in 2001 when the market was extremely small”, said Huang, whose areas charge users 600 yuan per minute or below. ” Because ( psychological counselling ) is expensive, and ordinary wage- earning classes ca n’t afford it. Only the privileged can”.
She continued, noting that most of those clients ‘ passions are parental or personal. She said that they’re immediately in need of emotional pressure relief. ” Our clients come from mostly divorced people with problems with baby rearing and education.”
Many people who seek counseling may be impacted by the disconnect between expectations and truth, Huang said. After China began reform and opening-up in the 1980s, some teenagers ‘ parents were raised, she said, riding the height of the economic growth and hoping their children would follow their success. They are firmly opposed to the notion that their children might never reach their full potential in school or never obtain the perfect job.
Industry insiders and scholars said the coming two years may be the optimum time for anxiety among Foreign families, with originally unknown pessimism over , careers and income , in the choppy post- pandemic economy driving the counselling industry’s expansion.