Young People and Emotional Distress v.1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How do young people accessing mental health services describe and understand emotional distress?
IRAS ID
130752
Contact name
Rebecca Fisher
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
The University of East London
Research summary
Title: How do young people accessing mental health services describe and understand emotional distress?
There exists a diverse understanding of how emotional distress affects an individual’s interaction with the world. Research to date has been focused on fitting emotions into labelled categories such as ’happy’ or ’sad’ without taking into consideration the context in which they occurred, how an individual learned to label their feelings or how these emotions impact on behaviour. Without the knowledge of personal experience mental health services will struggle to assess the efficiency of treatment available within the NHS.
Adolescence is a key stage to focus on because individuals are beginning to learn about and consider the emotions of others as well as their own. This involves multiple emotions and as a result, multiple attempts to manage them. This research proposes to examine emotional distress from the perspective of young people allowing them to elaborate on the emotions they are feeling and the impact this has on their lives. How these may subsequently affect their clinical treatment are aspects of young people’s experience that we need to know more about.
Young people attending Brookside inpatient unit will be asked to participate in the research with the hope of recruiting 8 to 12 individuals. Those who agree to participate will sign a consent form agreeing to two meetings. At the first meeting any questions or concerns they may have will be addressed. During the second meeting they will be asked about their understanding and experience of emotional distress and this will last for approximately one hour. The support and help they receive from the clinical team will not be affected if they decide at any time that they do not want to take part.
Participants and service users will be provided with a summary of the research results.
REC name
London - Camden & Kings Cross Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/LO/0616
Date of REC Opinion
22 May 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion