Nearly a quarter of secondary school learners in Wales reported having very high levels of mental health symptoms in the years following COVID-19, according to the latest report from the School Health Research Network (SHRN) at Cardiff University.
The report presents the findings of a large, school-based survey of young people in Wales, which is delivered by Cardiff University in partnership with Public Health Wales and Welsh Government and provides the first detailed overview of young people's health and wellbeing since the pandemic began. For the first time, a selection of the data can also be compared across local authority areas in Wales, thanks to a SHRN partnership with analysts at Public Health Wales, who have developed an online interactive dashboard to provide the survey results in more detail.
SHRN's Student Health and Wellbeing (SHW) survey is the largest of its kind in the UK, with more than 123,000 students in years 7 to 11 from 202 schools in Wales taking part in 2021/22. The wide-ranging survey, which is undertaken biennially, asks students about aspects of their physical and mental health and social relationships, with anonymised data shared with schools to inform localised practice.
Findings from the latest report show that 24% of young people in Wales have experienced very high levels of mental health symptoms, based on responses to the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire – a standard research tool used to assess children's mental health. Girls (28%) were almost twice as likely as boys (16%) to have reported very high levels of mental health symptoms.
Other measures showed one in two (53%) of young people also reported feeling at least some pressure from their schoolwork, with one in four (27%) feeling a lot of pressure.
Most of those surveyed felt there was support available to them; Two thirds (66%) agreed that there was a member of staff at school they could confide in and most said that they felt accepted by their teachers (70%). More than half (65%) of those surveyed agreed that they get the help and emotional support they need from their family, while almost two thirds (63%) agreed that they can count on their friends when things go wrong, with 29% agreeing "very strongly".
Professor Simon Murphy, Director of the Centre for Development, Evaluation, Complexity and Implementation in Public Health Improvement (DECIPHer), based at Cardiff University, and Chief Investigator of SHRN said: "Our research began just 18 months after the first Covid lockdown. It's therefore perhaps of little surprise that so many young people were experiencing mental health challenges and schoolwork pressures at this time."
