The term ‘mental health literacy’ refers to knowledge and beliefs about mental health problems that aid their recognition, management or prevention. Mental health literacy includes:
the ability to recognise mental health problems
knowledge and beliefs about risk factors and causes
knowledge about self-help interventions
knowledge and beliefs about professional help available
attitudes that assist with recognition and appropriate help-seeking; and
knowledge about how to seek appropriate mental health information.
Child mental health literacy has been overlooked
But what about child mental health literacy, which refers to adult knowledge and beliefs about mental health problems for children under 12 years of age? Aside from the recent work of the Emerging Minds: National Workforce Centre for Child Mental Health (NWCCMH) and beyondblue’s Be You initiative, there has been a noticeable lack of focus on child mental health literacy both in Australia and internationally.
The lack of focus on child mental health literacy has resulted in a need for common language to describe children’s mental health problems. It may also have fostered high levels of stigma towards children with mental health problems and their parents, as well as low levels of appropriate help-seeking by parents and caregivers. Low levels of child mental health literacy may also be one reason why the prevalence of children’s mental health problems in Australia has not decreased in the past 15 years, despite the increased availability of effective early interventions.