Holden wasn 't really shown any support from his parents, unlike Claudia, only his siblings. Holden’s parents were considering getting him psychoanalyzed after Holden’s brother died, but they sent him to boarding school instead. His parents continued to neglect him by ignoring his cries for help by sending him to a different school when he failed out of the one before it. The only person Holden allowed to actively support and understand him was his little sister Phoebe. Phoebe understood that his red hunting hat was like a safety blanket for Holden, “Then what [Phoebe] did-- it almost killed me-- she reached in the coat pocket and took out my red hunting hat and put it on my head. ‘Don 't you want it?’ I said ‘You can wear it a while’” (Salinger, 212)
At the end of the book we find out that Holden is in a mental institution and he was telling his whole story to his therapist which shows that Holden really did need help.
Pecola, unlike Holden and Claudia, is totally neglected by her parents. Neither of her parents care about her and her brother ran away, she has no one and has no idea what love is. “Then Pecola asked a question that had never entered my mind. ‘How do people do that? I mean, how do you get somebody to love you?’ But Frieda was
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Claudia, who had a lot of emotional support from her family didn’t show any signs of less-than-good mental health. Holden, however, wasn’t always supported enough and as a result, his mental health was not very good, he got the help he needed. Pecola was in a very unfortunate situation, she was neglected totally by her parents, she was raped and impregnated by her father at a very young age and lost the baby, which caused her to be extremely mentally unstable and no one ever really tried to help her. This is proof that children need support to have decent mental