Adolescent literacy
Summary
According to Bjørnsen et al. (2019), school health services play a significant role in providing students with health education. However, the authors find that mental health is a public health concern since the adolescent population within the school nurses do not receive mental health education. The article points put that adolescents need mental health education. This is because, as adolescents develop from childhood to adolescence, they build independence, increase the level of responsibility, and they need decision making ability (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). On matters of adolescent literacy, the article states that adolescents need health literacy skills and once they gain these skills, they will improve their mental well-being which will result in happiness and positive functioning. However, a point to note is that adolescent literacy has been studied in the areas of reading and writing to help adolescents become successful readers and writers. However, this article go beyond reading and writing and argue that young people need mental literacy to improve their mental health status. After investigating whether it is important for school nurses to provide adolescents with mental health education or mental health literacy, the findings show that adolescents who receive mental health literature increase mental well-being (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). Thus, schools of nursing should provide adolescents with mental health literacy. Another important point to note is that parental education increase adolescent literacy in terms of academic achievement. Parents with higher education help their children and they become responsible for a child's education. They create a positive parental involvement and they have higher expectation is that the child will get higher grades and succeed academically. However, the higher expectations affect the child's mental health and what happens is that the child develops lower mental well-being (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). Thus, adolescent literacy is beyond reading and writing but it also involves helping adolescents to address internalizing and externalizing problems.
Reaction to the authors' message
It is clear that the authors try to show that mental health literacy is important during adolescence. If adolescents would participate in self-report of reading and writing literacy, they would score significantly higher than self-report on mental health literacy. This indicates that adolescents lack mental health knowledge and what happens is that they suffer from depression and anxiety. I agree that adolescence literacy also entails mental health literacy for adolescents to have the ability to possess knowledge about mental health disorders, and self-help treatments (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). Once adolescents gain mental health literacy, they will develop self-esteem, problem-solving behaviors, motivation, increase well-being, and psychological functioning. In supporting mental health literacy, it is also important to put into consideration the difference between mental well-being between males and females. For example, women have internalizing disorders such as depression and men have externalizing disorders such as substance use disorder. Thus, mental health literacy will help both males and females develop self-acceptance, positive relations, autonomy, personal growth, and recognize their purpose in life (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). I also recognize the parental role in ensuring that a child grows in a nurturing environment and becomes a successful adult. However, parents only ensure literacy development in an education setting or they become involved in a child's education to enhance their authentic learning experience. I feel that even though parental involvement in a child's learning is of crucial benefit, there should be a plan to support adolescents to gain mental health literacy. I feel that adolescents need competency in reading and writing but the academy literacy should also address issues of mental health to help the adolescents make informed decisions. I also recommend the measurement of mental health literacy and create programs to promote mental health literacy. My take in this article is that adolescence is a critical stage in which adolescents’ nurturing environment determine how the future will look like. Thus, it is important to provide adolescents with mental health literacy to protect them from depression and anxiety that may not only affect their academic performance and behaviors but also their future life.
The implication to the advancement of knowledge
Focusing on the advancement of knowledge, this article states that mental health problems are a big concern among adolescents. Mental health promotion is needed and the schools should be at the forefront to promote mental health literacy. Note that mental health problems do not only affect the adolescents during the critical stage but the problems persist into adulthood and the effects also affect the family members (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). Thus, the school is an important setting to provide young people with mental literacy. Schools should set programs not only to increase reading and writing literacy but also mental health literacy for them to be successful both academically and emotionally. Recent findings have shown that there is limited availability of health services, and schools as well as the society are unable to meet the health needs of adolescents (Bjørnsen et al. 2019). To meet the needs of young people, school nurses should promote mental health by implementing strategies such as smaller group discussions, open seminars, and more. Another important point to note is that factors such as parental involvement and gender influence mental well-being. This suggests parents should therefore play a role in promoting mental health literacy.
Reference
Bjørnsen, H. N., Espnes, G. A., Eilertsen, M. E. B., Ringdal, R., & Moksnes, U. K. (2019). The
relationship between positive mental health literacy and mental well-being among
adolescents: Implications for school health services. The Journal of School
Nursing, 35(2), 107-116.
