Factors associated with acceptance of peers with mental health problems in childhood and adolescence

Background: Research suggests that children's reactions to peers with mental health problems are related to the maintenance and outcomes of these problems. However, children's perceptions of such peers, particularly those with internalising problems, are neither well researched nor understood. The present study aimed to test a series of models relating socio-demographic and attributional variables to the acceptance of hypothetical boys and girls with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. Methods: A sample of 595 participants, drawn from five different age-groups spanning early childhood to late adolescence, completed a booklet of questions in response to two vignettes describing the behaviour of hypothetical target peers with depression and ADHD. The sample was drawn from schools randomly selected in the east of Ireland. Results: The models indicated that age and gender of the participant, and the perceived responsibility of the target character for his/her condition, were the three most important predictors of acceptance in all models. However, the relationship between these variables and acceptance varied depending on the gender of the target child and the condition (depression or ADHD) in the models tested. Conclusions: The findings of the study suggest that the relationships between socio-demographic and attributional variables and acceptance of peers with mental health problems depend on the type of mental health problem under consideration. The findings have implications for the development of information and education programmes to improve the integration of children with mental health problems

Young children’s food brand knowledge. Early development and associations with television viewing and parent’s diet

Brand knowledge is a prerequisite of children’s requests and choices for branded foods. We explored the development of young children’s brand knowledge of foods highly advertised on television – both healthy and less healthy. Participants were 172 children aged 3–5 years in diverse socio-economic settings, from two jurisdictions on the island of Ireland with different regulatory environments. Results indicated that food brand knowledge (i) did not differ across jurisdictions; (ii) increased significantly between 3 and 4 years; and (iii) children had significantly greater knowledge of unhealthy food brands, compared with similarly advertised healthy brands. In addition, (iv) children’s healthy food brand knowledge was not related to their television viewing, their mother’s education, or parent or child eating. However, (v) unhealthy brand knowledge was significantly related to all these factors, although only parent eating and children’s age were independent predictors. Findings indicate that effects of food marketing for un- healthy foods take place through routes other than television advertising alone, and are present before pre-schoolers develop the concept of healthy eating. Implications are that marketing restrictions of un- healthy foods should extend beyond television advertising; and that family-focused obesity prevention programmes should begin before children are 3 years of age

How to tackle stigma and bias: Lessons from childhood diseases and disabilities

Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Obesity in Ireland, University of Ulster, Belfast, 7th May, 2014This paper considers the importance of tackling the stigma of obesity and focuses particularly on what is known about the way in which stigma develops.  Stigma is considered as a complex construct comprising attitudes, prejudices and discriminatory behaviour.  In light of this conceptualisation of stigma, a range of anti-stigma interventions are discussed that have been designed to tackle the stigma associated with epilepsy, Tourette's syndrome, obesity and mental disorders. The paper considers what is currently know about interventions that work and points to the limitations in the existing research on anti-stigma interventions. Finally some suggestions are made on how to move forward.Author has checked copyrigh

Ten of our stigma research findings and their implications

Presentation at the University of Nottingham, UK, 20 June, 2014Author has checked copyrigh

Children as service evaluators

In recent years there has been a growing interest in methods of eliciting children's views on factors influencing their lives. When children's views are sought it is important that this is done in a developmentally appropriate manner with instruments whose psychometric properties are known. The present review describes a variety of methods that have been used to evaluate children’s satisfaction with services in education, paediatrics and mental health. The majority of the studies used self completion questionnaires and provided only limited information on reliability. Means of establishing reliability and validity in research with children are discussed, as are the variables which have been found to correlate with child satisfaction.Not applicableke SB. 15/11/'1

Stigma and youth mental health: The importance of social context

The 2nd International Association of Youth Mental Health Conference, Brighton, UK, 30th September - 2nd October, 2013The term stigma has been widely used in the social sciences since the 1960s, however until recently it has rarely been applied in the context of youth mental health. This paper, which addresses the stigma of youth mental health, has two main aims. The first is to explain what is meant by stigma and to give examples of stigma drawn from interviews with young people with mental health problems.  The second aim is to explore what is known about the development of stigma and to argue that researchers interested in the topic could learn much from theoretical approaches to the study of the development of intergroup relationships and prejudice.  What is stigma? The term is complex but is usually considered to encompass three different components: stereotypes (e.g. young people with mental health problems are disruptive), prejudices (e.g. I would not like to be friends with someone with depression) and discrimination (e.g. I would not invite someone with schizophrenia to a party). The paper will begin by presenting young people's personal experiences of these components of stigma and will argue that social exclusion is a serious problem, as young people need to be part a network of peers in order to develop social skills and confidence.  Research also suggests that young people who stigmatize may themselves suffer, as they may be less willing to seek help if they develop mental health problems. The paper will then consider research on the development of stigmatizing attitudes by drawing on the findings of a series of studies with young people (from middle childhood through adolescence) that have explored negative attitudes towards peers with mental health problems.  Evidence from these studies suggests how young people react depends on their age, their gender and on the type of mental health problem they encounter in their peers. For example, research suggests that older teenagers are more accepting of behaviour associated with ADHD, whereas they are less accepting of males with symptoms of depression.  The findings of studies like this will be used to argue that developmental inter-group theory, originally proposed to explain the development of prejudice in childhood, has potential as a framework for understanding how mental health stigma develops.  The theory proposes that stigma begins to develop early in life as people are identified as different, through their behaviour their looks or the way they are treated.  Once children learn to categorize their peers, they are then susceptible to messages that peers who are different (such as those with mental health problems) have negative characteristics e.g. they are untrustworthy. The value of a unifying theoretical approach is that it can highlight gaps in existing knowledge about the development of stigma, it can point to important topics for future research and it can provide a rationale for the design and implementation of anti-stigma programmes.  Such efforts to reduce stigma have the potential to accrue long-term benefits by improving the quality of life of all young people.Author has checked copyrightAM

How to tackle stigma and bias: Lessons from childhood diseases and disabilities

Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Obesity in Ireland, University of Ulster, Belfast, 7th May, 2014This paper considers the importance of tackling the stigma of obesity and focuses particularly on what is known about the way in which stigma develops.  Stigma is considered as a complex construct comprising attitudes, prejudices and discriminatory behaviour.  In light of this conceptualisation of stigma, a range of anti-stigma interventions are discussed that have been designed to tackle the stigma associated with epilepsy, Tourette\u27s syndrome, obesity and mental disorders. The paper considers what is currently know about interventions that work and points to the limitations in the existing research on anti-stigma interventions. Finally some suggestions are made on how to move forward.Author has checked copyrigh

Focus group interviews in pediatric health care

Objective: To review and synethize the research material that exists on focus groups with children and adolescents and to provide guidelines for future development. Methods: Psychlit, Medline and Cinahl electronic databases, as well as the reference lists of those papers consulted were reviewed for information regarding the running of focus groups with participants under the age of 18 years. Both empirical and methodological papers were part of this review. Results: The utility of focus groups for exploratory research, program evaluation, program development and questionnaire construction or adaptation is reviewed. Based on previous research, guidelines for running focus groups with children and adolescents are provided and suggestions for future development are outlined. Conclusions: There is evidence to suggest that focus groups are a valuable means of eliciting children’s views on health related matters given an appropriate research question. However, empirical research is required in order to investigate systematically the effect of different processes and variables on the final outcome of focus group interviews.Not applicabl