Kompetent aktör eller psykiskt skör? : Barn- och flickdiskurser i konstruktionen om ungas psykiska ohälsa
(2019) In Tidskrift för genusvetenskap 40(1). p.71-71- Abstract
- Mental health problems among children and youth is positioned as one of the most urgent public health issues in Sweden today. Both research and official reports assert that mental health issues have increased among adolescents, especially girls, during the last decades. The aim of this study is to investigate how changes in childhood and gender discourses has implicated the construction of young people’s mental health as a public problem since the early 1990s up until today. The empirical material consists of documents published by state authorities between 1990 and 1998, and between 2006 and 2017. The results show that the construction of mental health issues among children and youth is characterized by an ideological and gendered shift,... (More)
- Mental health problems among children and youth is positioned as one of the most urgent public health issues in Sweden today. Both research and official reports assert that mental health issues have increased among adolescents, especially girls, during the last decades. The aim of this study is to investigate how changes in childhood and gender discourses has implicated the construction of young people’s mental health as a public problem since the early 1990s up until today. The empirical material consists of documents published by state authorities between 1990 and 1998, and between 2006 and 2017. The results show that the construction of mental health issues among children and youth is characterized by an ideological and gendered shift, promoting different ideals of childhood. In early 1990s, young people’s poor mental health was understood as a result of social inequality, most common among working-class boys with behavioral problems. Today, it is framed as an introvert phenomenon most common among girls, who are depicted as having trouble handling stress and performance-related pressure. In this shift, the child (read boy) is initially framed as a “child of society” in need of support, to later on being defined as a “competent child” (read girl) who has the responsibility to create a good life for herself. In this way, the construction of mental health among children and youths reflects how gender orders are reformulated in the individualized era, where young girls who do not embody neoliberal ideals of independency, flexibility, and female empowerment are framed as mentally fragile and in crisis. Furthermore, the construction shows how current ideas about the child as a competent actor has central implications for today’s understanding of young people’s mental health. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/43b4f1a4-b4dc-4360-94f4-bd09de7005dc
- author
- Callegari, Julia and Levander, Ulrika LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2019-05-01
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- psykisk ohälsa, unga, diskurs, barndom, flickskap, genus
- in
- Tidskrift för genusvetenskap
- volume
- 40
- issue
- 1
- pages
- 95 pages
- publisher
- Tidskrift för genusvetenskap, Karlstads universitet
- ISSN
- 1654-5443
- language
- Swedish
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 43b4f1a4-b4dc-4360-94f4-bd09de7005dc
- date added to LUP
- 2019-05-17 13:42:58
- date last changed
- 2021-03-22 17:42:56
@article{43b4f1a4-b4dc-4360-94f4-bd09de7005dc,
abstract = {{Mental health problems among children and youth is positioned as one of the most urgent public health issues in Sweden today. Both research and official reports assert that mental health issues have increased among adolescents, especially girls, during the last decades. The aim of this study is to investigate how changes in childhood and gender discourses has implicated the construction of young people’s mental health as a public problem since the early 1990s up until today. The empirical material consists of documents published by state authorities between 1990 and 1998, and between 2006 and 2017. The results show that the construction of mental health issues among children and youth is characterized by an ideological and gendered shift, promoting different ideals of childhood. In early 1990s, young people’s poor mental health was understood as a result of social inequality, most common among working-class boys with behavioral problems. Today, it is framed as an introvert phenomenon most common among girls, who are depicted as having trouble handling stress and performance-related pressure. In this shift, the child (read boy) is initially framed as a “child of society” in need of support, to later on being defined as a “competent child” (read girl) who has the responsibility to create a good life for herself. In this way, the construction of mental health among children and youths reflects how gender orders are reformulated in the individualized era, where young girls who do not embody neoliberal ideals of independency, flexibility, and female empowerment are framed as mentally fragile and in crisis. Furthermore, the construction shows how current ideas about the child as a competent actor has central implications for today’s understanding of young people’s mental health.}},
author = {{Callegari, Julia and Levander, Ulrika}},
issn = {{1654-5443}},
keywords = {{psykisk ohälsa; unga; diskurs; barndom; flickskap; genus}},
language = {{swe}},
month = {{05}},
number = {{1}},
pages = {{71--71}},
publisher = {{Tidskrift för genusvetenskap, Karlstads universitet}},
series = {{Tidskrift för genusvetenskap}},
title = {{Kompetent aktör eller psykiskt skör? : Barn- och flickdiskurser i konstruktionen om ungas psykiska ohälsa}},
volume = {{40}},
year = {{2019}},
}