Youth mental health and wellbeing

What it covers

This unit aims to consolidate your specific health-related knowledge, skills, pedagogies and capabilities. It focuses on the knowledge and understandings required to critically engage with mental health as a key priority health area for young people. The unit explores conceptualisations of mental health and wellbeing beyond illness and disease; including the role of emotions, identity, behaviours, and contemporary issues in shaping young people’s experiences of wellbeing. Students investigate the social, cultural, environmental and digital determinants that influence youth mental health, and consider how these intersect with contemporary challenges such as online environments, risk behaviours, and changing patterns of social connection. The unit critically examines risk and protective factors, including resilience and coping, and explores how these are shaped by broader social contexts. Through this unit, students develop a critical and evidence-informed understanding of youth mental health and wellbeing as a core area of contemporary health.

Assessment

When and where