A social enterprise providing education and information to protect and enhance the mental health of young people
Every year there appears to be another framework, resource or program on offer to assist schools with enhancing student wellbeing. Some are fantastic whilst others make claims that probably warrant further investigation. However, the Victorian Department of Education has released an excellent resource. Entitled Building Resilience: A Model [...]
Girls as young as seven are learning to dislike their own bodies because they have seen their mothers standing in front of the mirror describing themselves as fat or old, new research shows. The OnePoll survey found that seven out of 10 women said that their child had seen them engaging in “negative body language [...]
Antidepressant use among Americans is skyrocketing. Adults in the U.S. consumed four times more antidepressants in the late 2000s than they did in the early 1990s. As the third most frequently taken medication in the U.S., researchers estimate that 8 to 10 percent of the population is taking an antidepressant. But this spike does not [...]
The media is highly criticized for contributing to body image issues in adolescents. However, a study out today in Psychology of Women Quarterly finds a different source for body dissatisfaction among young girls: older girls at school. A research team led by Jaine Strauss, Professor of Psychology at Macalester College, surveyed 1,536 5th through 8th-grade female students attending schools [...]
"If you can get through year 8 and year 9, you can get through anything." That's a saying I share with students, teachers, and parents alike. These are tough years for many students, and if school is not a positive experience for them, they can feel hopeless. Hopelessness - believing things are bad and are [...]
Stress is a part of our lives and there’s no getting around it. But as much as we all live with it, many of us misunderstand some of the basics about stress and its role in our lives. Why does this matter? Stress has been indicted in many research studies in exacerbating very real physical [...]
While antidepressants are the most commonly used treatment for social anxiety disorder, new research suggests that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is more effective and, unlike medication, can have lasting effects long after treatment has stopped. Social anxiety disorder is a psychiatric condition characterized by intense fear and avoidance of social situations and affects up to [...]
Most people are guilty of emotional spending at one time or another. Whether you partake in retail therapy while you're sad, angry, or happy, you are bound to end up with some unneeded items and an empty wallet. So why do we spend to feel better, and how can we curb emotional spending in the [...]
One researcher is arguing that workplace stress brought on by deadlines and time crunches -- and the resulting harm done to our health, happiness and productivity -- is exacerbated by an unlikely element: clocks. Running on "clock time," as opposed to a less time-focused way of managing our lives, fundamentally alters our worldview. - Carolyn Gregoire [...]
Today’s children are at a higher risk for depression than any previous generation. Almost one in 10 children will experience a major depressive episode by the time they are 14 years old, and almost one in five will experience a major depressive episode before graduating from high school. The good news is, there is apparently something that [...]
