Adolescent Mental Health and Wellbeing
Adam Ezekiel – Director of Students
Future Proofing Study
Black Dog Institute
‘Insights into adolescent mental health and wellbeing’
Over the past few years, our School has been participating in the Black Dog Institute’s Future Proofing Study, the largest and most comprehensive long-term study of adolescent mental health in Australia.
The research team behind the Future Proofing Study have just released a 23 minute webinar to share their latest findings about the mental health and wellbeing of Australian adolescents.
We encourage you to watch this informative webinar to learn more about this important issue.
What the webinar covers:
Every year, researchers from the Black Dog Institute visit our School and many other Australian schools to survey the same group of over 6,000 students about their mental health and wellbeing. Study data is analysed and translated into practical resources, guidelines, and policy submissions in order to guide schools, families, and the government about issues relating to adolescent mental health and wellbeing.
Topics included the webinar:
- Background to the Future Proofing Study (at 1:46 minutes)
- Rates of mental health symptoms found in the study (at 4:06 minutes)
- Risk factors associated with development of depression and anxiety in early adolescence (at 6:55 minutes)
- Peer relationships (at 9:00 minutes)
- Sleep findings (at 12:22 minutes)
- Screen use (at 15:58 minutes)
- Mental health resources (at 22:58 minutes)
There is some discussion of self-harm and suicidal behaviour amongst young people in the webinar, so viewer discretion is advised.
In addition, the research team has developed a poster for students that you may wish to share with your child. The content of this poster was developed in consultation with participating students based on the research findings they most wanted to hear about. You can see the poster HERE should you wish to save it and below, for a quick summary.
If you have any questions about the research or would like to contact the research team directly, please email futureproofing@blackdog.org.au.
