Gregory Tess, Sincovich Alanna, Brushe Mary, Finlay-Jones Amy, Collier Luke R, Grace Blair, Sechague Monroy Neida, Brinkman Sally A
Telethon Kids Institute, The University of Western Australia, Level 7, 31 Flinders St, Adelaide, South Australia, 5000, Australia.
School of Public Health, The University of Adelaide, Level 9, Adelaide Health and Medical Science Building, 57 North Terrace, Adelaide, South Australia, 5005, Australia.
SSM Popul Health. 2021 Aug 26;15:100907. doi: 10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.100907. eCollection 2021 Sep.
Wellbeing and mental health are fundamental rights of children and adolescents essential for sustainable development. Understanding the epidemiology of child and adolescent wellbeing is essential to informing population health approaches to improving wellbeing and preventing mental illness. The present study estimated the prevalence of wellbeing and how wellbeing indicators were distributed across social and economic groups. This study used data from the 2019 Wellbeing and Engagement Collection; an annual census conducted in South Australian schools that measures self-reported wellbeing in students aged 8-18 years (n = 75,966). We estimated the prevalence (n, %) of low, medium and high wellbeing across five outcomes: life satisfaction, optimism, sadness, worries and happiness, overall and stratified by gender, age, language background, socio-economic position and geographical remoteness. The prevalence of low wellbeing on each indicator was: happiness 13%, optimism 16%, life satisfaction 22%, sadness 16% and worries 25%. The prevalence of low wellbeing increased with age, particularly for females. For example, 22.5% of females aged 8-10 years had high levels of worries compared to 43.6% of 15 to 18-year old females. Socioeconomic inequality in wellbeing was evident on all indicators, with 19.5% of children in the most disadvantaged communities having high levels of sadness compared to 12.5% of children in the most advantaged communities. Many children and adolescents experience low wellbeing on one or more indicators (40.7%). The scale of this problem warrants a population-level preventative health response, in addition to a clinical, individual-level responses to acute mental health needs. Universal school-based programs that support social and emotional wellbeing have a role to play in this response but need to be supported by universal and targeted responses from outside of the education system.
幸福和心理健康是儿童和青少年的基本权利，对可持续发展至关重要。了解儿童和青少年幸福的流行病学对于为改善幸福和预防精神疾病的人群健康方法提供信息至关重要。本研究估计了幸福的患病率以及幸福指标在社会和经济群体中的分布情况。本研究使用了2019年幸福与参与度收集的数据；这是一项在南澳大利亚学校进行的年度普查，测量8至18岁学生自我报告的幸福感（n = 75,966）。我们估计了五个结果中低、中、高幸福感的患病率（n，%）：生活满意度、乐观主义、悲伤、担忧和幸福，总体情况以及按性别、年龄、语言背景、社会经济地位和地理偏远程度分层。每个指标上低幸福感的患病率分别为：幸福13%，乐观主义16%，生活满意度22%，悲伤16%，担忧25%。低幸福感的患病率随年龄增长而增加，尤其是女性。例如，8至10岁的女性中有22.5%有高度担忧，而15至18岁的女性中有43.6%有高度担忧。幸福方面的社会经济不平等在所有指标上都很明显，最弱势社区中19.5%的儿童有高度悲伤，而最优势社区中这一比例为12.5%。许多儿童和青少年在一个或多个指标上经历低幸福感（40.7%）。除了对急性心理健康需求的临床、个体层面的应对措施外，这个问题的规模需要一个人群层面的预防性健康应对措施。支持社会和情感幸福的基于学校的普遍项目在这一应对措施中可以发挥作用，但需要教育系统之外的普遍和有针对性的应对措施的支持。
