Teens ignorant about mental health
Updated on 07 September 2008
Young people know little about mental health problems, with 46% of 12 to 18-year-olds unable to name a single mental health condition, a poll has revealed.
The survey, for Great Ormond Street Hospital, found 53% of young people do not think schools do enough to raise awareness of mental health issues.
Half (50%) of girls aged 17 and 18 said they gained understanding of mental health problems from celebrities talking about their issues.
In 2006/07, a total of 21,859 under-18s were admitted to hospital in England for self-harming. Another 3,509 were admitted to see a psychiatric consultant and 1.4% of 11 to 16-year-olds in the UK are thought to be "seriously depressed".
The poll found that many young people knew little about mental health issues, with most incorrectly labelling Down's syndrome and dyslexia as mental health-related conditions.
Boys aged 12 to 14 were least likely to be able to name a mental health condition, with 59% unable to list any.
There were also clear discrepancies in the views held by boys and girls on what were the most common mental health problems.
Anorexia was identified by 19% of girls aged 12 to 18 as the second most common mental health problem among people their age, while for 17% of boys it was depression. For girls aged 12 to 14, anorexia was considered the joint first most common mental health condition (26%) alongside substance abuse.
For boys in the same age bracket, substance abuse was considered the most common (35%) while anorexia was named joint fourth most prevalent alongside phobias (9%).
Official statistics on the most common mental health problems among each sex are not collected. The poll was carried out among more than 500 young people to launch a new Great Ormond Street website on mental health aimed at young people.
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