Grammar Gazette- Issue 1, 2012

Caring for the mental wellbeing of teenage girls

Physically healthier than ever before, Australian youth are suffering from increasing rates of mental health issues. The incidence of mental health disorders in young people is now well documented and is shown to be the highest of any age group. The question may be asked, are young people becoming more emotional or are we simply recognising it more?

The developmental stage of adolescence presents many challenges including identity development, emerging sexuality, separating from parents, and making decisions for the first time, along with significant physical, intellectual, and hormonal changes. These stresses can present differently

Professor Patrick McGorry, who is a leading expert in the field of mental health and was the 2010 Australian of the Year, believes our current generation of young people are precariously walking a tightrope with an inadequate safety net below them. He challenges the notion that our society is over-medicalising its response to the mental health of young people and asserts that as little as thirteen per cent of young men and only thirty-one per cent of young women are accessing the care they need (Sawyer et al., 2000). Meaning thousands of young people who are struggling with mental health issues are falling through the gaps. I was privileged to listen to Professor McGrorry at the annual School Counsellors and Psychologists Conference in Melbourne towards the end of last year. Stretching over two days, this conference covered a breadth of topics including self harm, school shootings, childhood obesity, bullying, computer based treatments for anxiety, and the neurobiology of addiction. The varied topics and calibre of presenters involved indicates the emergence and significance of the school counsellor/psychologist’s role in education. Professor McGorry recommends that young people should have the same access to quality care for mental illness as for physical illness and that the age of onset of mental health issues should be the key parameter in structuring services. He believes that a twenty-first century approach to mental health means that responses to mental illness from family, friends, workmates and health

from boys to girls. Studies demonstrate that teenage girls have considerably higher rates of depression, anxiety disorders, eating disorders, and adjustment disorders than teenage boys, who have higher rates of disruptive behaviour disorders (beyondblue, 2010). Although most young people will weather this developmental stage, it is important to recognise that the majority of anxiety and mood disorders first emerge during this period. In fact, seventy five per cent of all mental health disorders have surfaced by the age of 25 years, and the Australia’s Health 2010 report indicated that mental health disorders accounted for half the burden of disease for young people. Nine per cent of primary school aged children and twenty-six per cent of adolescents experience a mental health issue.

13 Grammar Gazette Autumn 2012