It has recently been suggested that as many as one in five adolescents have a mental health problem that will persist into adulthood, with the most common being anxiety (Lee, Heimer, Giedd, Lein, Sestan, Weinberger, Casey, 2014). Young people suffering poor mental health problems face a number of risks such as suicide, chronic illness, school failure and relationship difficulties (Thompson, Hooper, Laver-Bradbury, Gale, 2012). Research estimates that up to seventy five percent of all mental illness has already developed by the age of eighteen (Murphy and Fonagy, 2012), yet only a portion of these individuals actually seek help during the phase of adolescence, reducing the opportunity for early intervention. Recent research has aimed to explore what may be preventing help-seeking during difficult times (e.g. Kendal, Callery, Keeley, 2011a). Studies have shown that women seem to be particularly at risk of developing mental health issues with rates of anxiety and depression amongst teenage girls having risen over recent years, whilst remaining relatively stable for adolescent boys (DfE, 2016).
In this qualitative study, I employed visual methods to provide three 15 year old female participants with the opportunity to creatively explore their journeys of having had a mental health issue. After creating collages, time-lines and storyboards to map significant periods and events, I employed a narrative approach for conducting semi-structured individual interviews to reflect on their story-boards and talk about their experiences. These interviews were then analysed to look for individual and common themes.
I was particularly interested in barriers or supportive factors to seeking and receiving help. It was hoped that information from this study may elicit the voice of young people to add to professional understanding of how adolescent girls experience having a mental health issue and ultimately what may or may not help, both in preventing and directly addressing difficulties.
