Tagged: Mental health

School anxiety in the time of COVID: how parents and teachers can help kids cope - COVID-19

Guest Author • Feb 10, 2022 •

• Anxiety,
• children,
• COVID-19,
• education,
• Mental health

Christine Grové, Monash University and Kelly-Ann Allen, Monash University   With COVID-related school closures and long periods of remote learning, many kids across Australia have not physically been at school for most of the past two years. Because of the time away, some children might get extremely upset about going back, some might try to avoid school, while others … Read More

Emotional vaccine: 3 ways we can move from ‘languishing’ to ‘flourishing’ in these testing times - COVID-19

Guest Author • Sep 28, 2021 •

• COVID-19,
• emotions,
• Mental health,
• New Zealand stories

Dougal Sutherland, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington   If you’re feeling uninspired, stagnant and joyless, you’re not alone. A sense of languishing is one of the dominant emotions of 2021 as we navigate life in an ongoing pandemic and process other terrible world events alongside. But although many people are struggling and these struggles are … Read More

Counselling almost always happens in a room — what if more people had the option of going outside? - Guest Work

Guest Author • Sep 10, 2021 •

• Mental health,
• outdoor therapy,
• psychotherapy

Will W Dobud, Charles Sturt University   If you peered through the keyhole of any psychotherapy session, chances are they would all look very similar. There may be nearly 1,000 types of therapies — such as cognitive behavioural and family therapy — but you will typically find a client and practitioner in a room, sitting opposite each … Read More

‘Living with COVID’ looks very different for front-line health workers, who are already exhausted - COVID-19

Guest Author • Sep 07, 2021 •

• Australia,
• COVID-19,
• health professionals,
• Mental health

Karen Willis, Victoria University and Natasha Smallwood, Monash University   With the Delta variant raging across New South Wales and Victoria, health services are stretched and strained. Behind the scenes is a fearful, anxious and overburdened workforce. In the next few months, the health workforce will care for many more patients with COVID-19, with case numbers in NSW expected … Read More

The rise of pop-psychology: can it make your life better, or is it all snake-oil? - Guest Work

Guest Author • May 04, 2021 •

• Mental health,
• Psychology,
• self-help

Nick Haslam, The University of Melbourne   More than 50 years ago, George Miller, president of the American Psychological Association, urged his colleagues “to give psychology away”. No, cynical reader, he was not instructing his followers to abandon the field. Rather he hoped raising the general public’s awareness of psychology would help to solve society’s problems. In the half century … Read More

Road to nowhere: New Zealanders struggle to get the help they need, 2 years on from a funding boost for mental health services - News

Guest Author • Apr 19, 2021 •

• COVID-19,
• Mental health,
• New Zealand stories,
• Psychology

Dougal Sutherland, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington As part of New Zealand’s well-being budget in 2019, the government announced an unprecedented NZ$1.9 billion increase in funding for the mental health sector. But almost two years on, there are no tangible signs of improvement and statistics show the number of New Zealanders seeking, but not receiving, … Read More

Floods leave a legacy of mental health problems — and disadvantaged people are often hardest hit - Guest Work

Guest Author • Mar 22, 2021 •

• disasters,
• floods,
• Mental health

Sabrina Pit, Western Sydney University Yet again, large swathes of New South Wales are underwater. A week of solid rain has led to floods in the Mid-North Coast, Sydney and the Central Coast, with several areas being evacuated as I write. As a resident of the NSW Far North Coast, which has had its share of devastating floods, many … Read More

COVID-19: Life’s stresses just as important as health and economics - The Psychology Report

Sarb Johal • Mar 17, 2020 •

• coronavirus,
• COVID-19,
• finances,
• Mental health,
• problems of living,
• Psychology

When we talk about disasters or a crisis, we often focus on the disruption and stress caused by the index event or occurrence itself. In the case of Covid-19, it’s the health impact of the virus on people and communities. However, secondary stressors are circumstances, events or policies that are indirectly related to or are a consequence of an … Read More

Extremism is not a mental illness - Guest Work

Guest Author • Mar 20, 2019 •

• Mental health,
• racism,
• terrorism

Shaun Robinson, Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand Following Friday’s appalling terrorist attack, the Mental Health Foundation has been disappointed but unsurprised to see some people speculating the terrorist must have been mentally ill. We understand why it’s comforting to think this. We all want to think the terrorist is an outlier, an outsider, different to us. We … Read More

Mental health in public life: Is the experience of politicians and how we make policy intertwined? - The Psychology Report

Sarb Johal • Sep 03, 2018 •

• Mental health,
• policy,
• politics

Many societies are experiencing significant increases in those reporting mental health difficulties and illnesses, but face systemic obstacles in helping their communities’ to deal with these problems. The WHO report on Mental health: New Understandings, New Hope identified mental health as possibly posing the most difficult and acute health care challenge of the twenty-first century. The report goes on to … Read More