Mental Disorders in Children & Adolescents

The assignment focuses on understanding the prevalence and causes of mental health disorders among children and adolescents. It aims to estimate the number of affected individuals within specific age groups (3-14 and 15-18) and investigates the contributing factors. The research acknowledges challenges such as difficulty obtaining firsthand information from children due to their limited ability to express themselves and potential limitations in sample size accuracy.

Running Head: MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES IN CHILDREN AND ADOLECENTS1
MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES IN CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE
Name
Institutional Affiliation

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Introduction
This report researches on the issues that affect children and adolescents suffering
from mental health. Mental health involves emotional, psychological and social well
being of an individual. People suffering from mental health face many challenges in
their day to day life and it is therefore important to understand how to address issues
surrounding mental health among children. According to the World Health
Organization(WHO), between 10 to 20% of children and adolescents experience
mental disorders. More than half of these mental illnesses begin at age 14.
Neuropsychiatric conditions are the leading cause of mental disorders among children
and young people. If these conditions are not treated early, they greatly affect the
development of a child and their potential to live fulfilling lives. It is therefore
important to understand how mental health issues among children and adolescents can
be addressed to help them live normal and fulfilling lives. This research project
identifies the causes of mental disorders among children. The report also discusses
how mental health disorder affects the lives of the children and how the mental health
issues can be addressed.
Aims and objectives
The following are the aims and objectives of this research project:
 To understand the causes of mental health disorders among children and
adolescents.
 To establish how poor mental health affects the well being and development of
children and adolescents.

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 To establish ways through which mental health problems among children and
adolescents can be prevented.
 To identify ways through which mental health problems can be resolved and
managed to minimize their effect on the life of an individual.
Literature review
According to WHO, 10 to 20% of children between the age of 5 and 18 suffer
from mental disorders. In Australia, approximately 9 % of children suffer from mental
health issues. Researchers in the past have tried to understand the prevalence of
mental disorders in children and adolescents in Australia. One of the tools used in
determining this is the Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children Version IV(DISC-
IV). This is a validated tool used in identifying mental disorders in children and
adolescents as contained in the Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders Version
IV(DSM-IV). The models used in DISC include; Anxiety disorders, major depressive
disorder, attention-deficit disorder, and conduct disorder.
According to the research conducted by Hazen et al. (2011), about one in every
eleven children experience mental health issues. This, therefore, means that
approximately 580,000 children and adolescents in Australia suffer related mental
disorders. The research indicated that the prevalence of mental disorders varied
between male and females. 16.5% of males had mental disorders while 11.5% of
females suffered related mental disorders.
Research also indicates that anxiety-related disorder is the main cause of mental
disorder among children and adolescents in Australia. More than 60 % of children and
adolescents who suffer related mental disorders are as a result anxiety disorder. It is

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largely assumed that children are carefree and do not have issues that stress them.
However, research indicates that children above the age of 11 years suffer anxiety as a
result of many factors. Some of the factors that lead to anxiety among children
include; separation from parents, fear of injury and death among older children, fear
of darkness, monster and insects among children of between 3 and four years. The
second leading cause of mental disorders among adolescents is a stress-related
disorder. They include acute stress disorder and posttraumatic stress disorder(PTSD).
Children are affected mentally when exposed to traumatic events such as sexual
assault, car accidents, and excessive punishment and beating by those close to them.
According to Dogra & Leighton, (2009), children suffering from mental health
disorders experience many problems and challenges in their life. He explains that
poor mental health of children affects their learning.and development.Children
between the age of 8 and 15 years undergo a lot of development during this stage. A
child with poor mental health may not grow normally both physically and
psychologically. The mental disorder affects their ability to feed and grow in mind.
This stage is also very important in learning at school, and hence education children
suffering from mental health disorder may be affected. Mental health disorder also
affects the social life of children and adolescent. Research indicates that children with
mental health issues are shy and they don’t normally interact with others in their age
brackets. They also find it difficult to enter into a relationship with the people of the
other gender. Dogra & Leighton, (2009)indicates that adolescents suffering from
mental disorders fall into depression and may get suicidal.
To address mental disorders among children and adolescents, parents need to take
first responsibility to ensure that they do not expose their children to events and
conditions that may affect the mental health of their children (Evans, Annenberg

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Public Policy Center& Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands, 2017). Parents
should stay close to their children to ensure that they detect any emotional or
behavioral changes that may indicate mental health problems among the children.
Teachers at school should also play a huge role in ensuring good mental health for
adolescents who spend most of their time at school.
The significance of the study
There is a huge number of children and adolescents in Australia suffering from
Mental disorders. Most of these children and adolescents do not receive the help and
care that they require to overcome the mental disorder they suffer. This may be
because their parents, guardians, and teachers are not aware of what the children are
suffering from("Treating mental health disorders in children and adolescents", 2015).
Children and adolescents suffer for many years, and this affects both their social life,
development, and education (Giulio & Gau, 2016). By conducting this research, it
will be possible to identify the prevalence of mental health disorder among children
and adolescents. This will, therefore, help parents and society, in general, to reduce
cases of mental health disorders among children and adolescents since they will
understand the causes of the disorder(Johnson, Lawrence, Perales, Baxter & Zubrick,
2017). The study will also help to identify ways in which mental health disorders can
be prevented among adolescents as well as help those already suffering from the
disorder to seek treatment.
Methodology
The study aims at collecting information from 250 families across Australia who
has children of between 3-14 years. Another sample of families with children aged
between 15-18 years was taken to help understand mental health among adolescents.

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The participants of the study will be chosen randomly from all regions in Australia.
The research will involve people living in the poor and rich neighborhood. This will
help to understand how social status and economic well-being of a family may affect
the mental health of children and adolescents (Abela & Hankin, 2008). The
population of male and female children selected for the study will be the same to
ensure accurate information is derived from the study.
The study will be conducted using a qualitative research method. This method
will be used because of the nature of the data required for this study (Brown, 2008).
The information is descriptive because it seeks to explain emotions and feelings
which are not measurable numerically. Information collected in this study. Parents of
children within the age bracket indicated will be asked questions aims towards
answering the research questions. The research will be conducted through interviews
with the identified sample population.
The study will use non-experimental research framework. Data for this study will
be conducted through interviews. Interview questions will be designed, and
participants will be interviewed at least three times over a period. Interviews will help
to capture the feelings and emotions of families who have children suffering from
mental disorders. Interviews will also offer the participants an opportunity to explain
their experiences and thoughts in detail. Random sampling method will be used to
determine the sample population to be used for this study (Sadock& Sadock, 2008).
The ethical considerations that are important during this study are ensuring that the
questions asked to the respondents are not too personal that they may affect the
families of the children who have a mental disorder.
Scope and challenges

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The study uses past literature to estimate how many children and adolescents
suffer mental health disorders. The study also seeks to find mental health prevalence
for children between age 3- 14 and adolescents aged between 15-18 years. This
research is wide in scope since it also aims at establishing the causes of mental
disorder among children and adolescents.
Some of the challenges that are expected during the study are that it will be
difficult to get first-hand information about how mental disorder affects children since
most of them cannot express themselves (McNally, 2011). The sample size is very
small compared to the entire population, and hence the results of the study may not be
very accurate.

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References
Abela, J. R. Z., & Hankin, B. L. (2008). Handbook of depression in children and
adolescents. New York: Guilford Press.
Brown, R. T. (2008). Childhood mental health disorders: Evidence base and
contextual factors for psychosocial, psychopharmacological, and combined
interventions. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Evans, D. L., Annenberg Public Policy Center, & Annenberg Foundation Trust at
Sunnylands, (2017). Treating and preventing adolescent mental health disorders:
What we know and what we don't know: a research agenda for improving the
mental health of our youth.
Dogra, N., & Leighton, S. (2009). Nursing in child and adolescent mental health.
Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Giulio, A., & Gau, S. S.-F. (2016). Positive mental health, fighting stigma and
promoting resiliency for children and adolescents. Amsterdam [Netherlands:
Academic Press.
Goldstein, M. L., & Morewitz, S. (2011). Chronic Disorders in Children and
Adolescents [recurso electrónico]. Estados Unidos: Springer New York.
Hazen, E. P., Goldstein, M. A., & Goldstein, M. C. (2011). Mental health disorders in
adolescents: A guide for parents, teachers, and professionals. New Brunswick,
N.J: Rutgers University Press.

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Johnson, S., Lawrence, D., Perales, F., Baxter, J., & Zubrick, S. (2017). Prevalence of
Mental Disorders Among Children and Adolescents of Parents with Self-
Reported Mental Health Problems. Community Mental Health Journal, 54(6),
884-897. doi: 10.1007/s10597-017-0217-5
McNally, R. J. (2011). What is mental illness?. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press
National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health (Great Britain), Social Care Institute
for Excellence (Great Britain), & National Institute for Health and Care
Excellence (Great Britain),. (2013). Antisocial behavior and conduct disorders in
children and young people: Recognition, intervention, and management.
Sadock, B. J., & Sadock, V. A. (2008). Kaplan and Sadock's concise textbook of
clinical psychiatry. Philadelphia: Lippincott-Raven.
Treating mental health disorders in children and adolescents. (2015). The
Pharmaceutical Journal. doi: 10.1211/pj.2015.20067142