Why we need to foster the ‘root systems’ underpinning mental health and wellbeing in children and adolescents in schools
The current child and adolescent mental health and wellbeing crisis makes it clear that we need to rethink how we understand and foster mental health and wellbeing during development. I have recently formulated a new neuroscience-based framework explaining the psychological and neural processes underpinning mental health and wellbeing and their development. We can think of these processes as the ‘root systems’ enabling mental health to ‘grow’ and wellbeing to flourish. In comparison, most current approaches to mental health and wellbeing in children and adolescents focus on addressing or preventing symptoms of mental ill-health – these could be thought of as ‘the branches’ growing out of the ‘root system’ processes.
There are several advantages to cultivating the ‘root systems’ of mental health and wellbeing – I call the root systems ‘capacities’ because they can be fostered by learning relevant skills and knowledge. The first advantage of focusing on capacities rather than symptoms, is that capacities have a wider reach and impact. Different symptoms, such as repetitive negative thoughts in subclinical depression or anxiety and other conditions, share the same root capacities that we can strengthen to help children and adolescents manage negative thoughts.
The second advantage of focusing on capacities is that they enable us to ‘make sense’ of the myriad of mental health and wellbeing concepts that often overlap. For example, both self-regulation and resilience, which are often targeted in mental health interventions in schools, share many of the same underpinning capacities. Treating them as different may make it seem like we are cultivating different knowledge and skills and undermine continuity of learning or create artificial sense of competition between approaches.
The final advantage of focusing on capacities underpinning mental health and wellbeing is that they can be readily translated into skills and knowledge that we need to foster to strengthen the ‘root systems’ of mental health and wellbeing in education. When it comes to learning such skills and knowledge, the capacities can make their progression and links between them more visible.
For example, the capacities show how fostering awareness of emotions needs to be followed by learning simple emotion regulation strategies such as emotional labeling – naming of emotions – that can reduce intensity of emotions. Building further on such skills, children and adolescents can learn to manage their attention more skillfully to both use distractions in regulating their emotions and reduce distractions to support their mental health and wellbeing. Other strategies can expand these skills further towards relational wellbeing involving building of connections, prosociality and developing a sense of purpose and meaning in life.
I often highlight in my research and writing that we need to start thinking of learning mental health and wellbeing skills in schools in the same way we are approaching learning to read or do maths. All these skills require careful scaffolding, repetition, time and practice within and outside of schools. My latest book – Making Sense of Mental Health and Wellbeing in Primary Schools: A Practical, Neuroscience-Based Guide – specifies the key capacities underpinning mental health and wellbeing in detail, together with a trauma-informed 7-Step approach to fostering these capacities systematically and gradually across primary school years.
Over the past two years I worked with the PSHE Association on translating my new neurodevelopmental theory of mental health and wellbeing detailing the capacities into an innovative comprehensive mental health and wellbeing curriculum for primary schools in England called The Foundations for Wellbeing. Here is a short article explaining why I worked on this project and what it involved: How can we do a better job at teaching children mental health and wellbeing knowledge and skills in primary schools?
Alongside this work, I often highlight that in order to shift the child and adolescent mental health crisis, we also need to acknowledge and address systemic factors impacting child and adolescent mental health and wellbeing. These include poverty, discrimination, slow action on climate change and negative impacts of social media fueled by AI in service of the attention economy. Political polarisation is an underlying factor hampering efforts to address all of these influences. My research, impact work with policy makers and non-profit organisations together with writings for educators and mental health professionals aim to contribute to much needed changes in our approaches to the child and adolescent mental health crisis.
New Book (now available for pre-order):
From the book cover: Building on the latest research in developmental neuroscience, this book provides an evidence-based, accessible and practical roadmap for those looking for more effective ways to support primary school pupils’ mental health and wellbeing.
The guide begins by analysing current approaches before presenting a new, comprehensive framework for mental health and wellbeing curricula in primary schools. Focusing on building up mental health knowledge and key skills of children in a neuroscience-informed and age-appropriate way, the book:
- Translates key developmental processes in the mind and brain into learning outcomes, knowledge and skills with focus on Reception stage, KS1, and lower and upper KS2
- Lays out a 7-step, trauma-informed pedagogical approach for teaching mental health and wellbeing and provides a plethora of relevant activity examples
- Looks at the implementation of the curriculum framework as a whole school approach in primary schools, including its positioning within wider social contexts
- Explains key terms, with case studies and reflection opportunities throughout.
This innovative book is a must-have guide for primary school educators interested in understanding the mental health and wellbeing development of their pupils and finding research-based ways to effectively support them long-term. It is also valuable reading for pastoral leaders in schools, mental health professionals and policy makers.
Accessible articles:
If we want to effectively support young people experiencing climate anxiety, we need to address both its mental health and social aspects. In this article I suggest some possible ways how this could be done in schools – Why fostering children’s mental health and wellbeing capacities in schools may help reduce their climate anxiety
In response to the discussion in the media about the role of resilience in child and adolescent mental health, here is my latest article in The Conversation that considers Why resilience won’t solve the mental health crisis among young people.
In this article for UNESCO Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development I discuss why and how neuroscience research can support teaching of mental health and wellbeing skills in schools. Have a read: Neuroscience of Wellbeing: A developmental educational perspective.