• Question: What age do you think commonly has more mental illnesses?

    Asked by anon-216549 to Robert, Olly, Nicola, Jasmin, Dennis, Caroline on 15 Jun 2019.
    • Photo: Robert Dempsey

      Robert Dempsey answered on 15 Jun 2019: last edited 18 Jun 2019 1:49 pm

      I don’t think one age group has more mental health issues but there are some key developmental stages (especially adolescence/teenage years and early childhood) where early experiences may have long term effects on our mental health. People can experience poor mental health at any age often as a result of a trigger (like a life event) and there’s more recognition that people in their middle age have some of the worse mental health outcomes. It’s difficult to say that one age group has more mental health issues as different ages may experience different issues.

    • Photo: Caroline Brett

      Caroline Brett answered on 15 Jun 2019:

      I’ve read in various places that the majority of mental illnesses develop by the early 20s, but actually that means that a good proportion don’t develop until late. Plus some illnesses persist for a long time, or come and go depending on what’s happening in someone’s life, while others are more acute and can be treated quickly and then get better. There are some illnesses or disorders that are more likely to develop later in life, and sadly things like depression are very common in middle age (particularly men, who have a higher rate of death by suicide than younger men).
      So I don’t think there is a particular age at which mental illnesses in general are more common, although particular illnesses might be more common at particular ages.

    • Photo: Dennis Relojo-Howell

      Dennis Relojo-Howell answered on 15 Jun 2019:

      There’s one psychologist who does research on this area: Dr Ronald Kessler. According to his research (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15939837), 50% of mental health problems are established by age 14 and 75% by age 24. He also found out that many mental disorders usually occurs in childhood or adolescence (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1925038/).

    • Photo: Nicola Johnstone

      Nicola Johnstone answered on 16 Jun 2019:

      Mental illness really doesn’t happen more at one age but is more likely to occur around big life events (good or bad) that mean we have to make changes or adapt. Our ability to cope with change is partly modelled on how we experienced things in adolescence to early adulthood, but we keep learning as we age,

    • Photo: Jasmin Moon

      Jasmin Moon answered on 17 Jun 2019:

      Although I think teenagers can be most susceptible to mental health problems, they can occur at any age depending on your own resilience, genetics and life events.
      I think it’s important that even from a young age people are taught how to manage worry and recognise low mood in themselves and others so that they have the skills for life and are better able to ‘bounce back’ from difficulties in the future.

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