Young people's difficulty in talking to others about mental health problems: An analysis of time trends in Switzerland

Abstract

The article aimed to analyse time trends regarding young people's willingness to talk about mental health problems. Data on 16774 participants (16-to 20-year olds) of the 'Swiss Multicentre Adolescent Survey on Health' (SMASH) were analysed. The survey was conducted in 1992/93 and in 2002.Logistic regression analyses were conducted to identify predictors associated with the self-reported willingness of youth to talk about mental health problems with adults (other than parents), friends or no one. Socio-demographic characteristics were used as covariates. These analyses were first carried out for the total sample and, in a second step, stratified by suicidality of the participants. The percentage of participants who would talk about mental health problems with adults or friends increased between 1992/1993 and 2002, while the percentage of those who would not talk about such problems decreased. This pattern was confirmed in the stratified analyses (i.e., for suicidal and nonsuicidal individuals). Hence, Swiss youth seem to have less difficulty in talking with others about mental health problems than previous cohorts. This trend towards increased disclosure may have implications for claims that the prevalence of mental health problems has increased in recent decades.Key words: mental health problem; disclosing; informal help; time trends; adolescence; SMASH 3 Introduction 1Studies have shown an increasing prevalence of some mental health problems in both youth (Bor et al., 2014;Collishaw et al., 2004;Collishaw et al., 2010) and adult (Jorm and Butterworth, 2006;Mojtabai, 2011;Reavley et al., 2011) populations in recent decades. This change might reflect an actual worsening of the population's mental health (Collishaw et al., 2004;Collishaw et al., 2010) or may be due to an increased willingness to disclose diagnosed disorders or symptoms. In a recentAustralian study, it was concluded that the number of those (aged 15+) revealing mental health problems increased between 1995 and 2011 due to an increased willingness of people to disclose such problems . In-line with this, a study from the United States showed that 18-to 54-year olds who have participated in a more recent survey (2000)(2001)(2002)(2003) were more comfortable talking with a professional about personal problems and would have been less embarrassed if others found out about it relative to those who have participated in 1990 -1992(Mojtabai, 2007.If a person suffers from a mental health problem, they are likely to consider the pros and cons of talking about it. The fear of being stigmatized might hinder the person from disclosing their problems and seeking professional help (Gulliver et al., 2010;Rickwood et al., 2005;Schomerus and Angermeyer, 2008;Yap et al., 2013). Furthermore, if a person expects that talking about mental health problems would not lead to an improvement of their situation or if they prefer to handle the problem without help from others, they might decide not to disclose (Gulliver et al., 2010;Mojtabai et al., 2011;Rickwood et al...

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