Exploring Pathways to Children and Young People’s Mental Health

The aim of this project is to better understand pathways to mental health outcomes from childhood to late adolescence/early adulthood. This will help identify the timing and targets of prevention and intervention initiatives, with potential benefits for children and young people and their families, mental health researchers, health, social care, education and legal practitioners and services, and policymakers. 

Together this research community will:  

1. Share interdisciplinary expertise;   
2. Collaborate with PPI and external stakeholders to bridge the gap between research and practice;   
3. Identify existing datasets and data linkage opportunities for secondary analysis in the UK and overseas; and   
4. Work with researchers from different disciplines in GW4 institutions to develop competitive applications for external funding to enable us to achieve our main goal.   

 The main funded activity for the Development Award is a Research Away Day and Networking Dinner where attendees will discuss, reflect, build relationships and plan free from any distractions in a peaceful environment.  The day will include working groups on longitudinal research and data linkage, focused knowledge-sharing on the timing of puberty, how this relates to mental health and the extent to which research in this area has reached policy and practice.  Further funding opportunities will be identified with the intention of sustaining the community and taking forward collaborative GW4 research in this important area with the aim of having a real impact not only on the research landscape but also on the lives of young people and their families. 

Find out more at the community’s website Exploring pathways to children and young people’s mental health: GW4 Research Network where you can sign up to join the network