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Facts and figures about young people and mental health

Here are some key stats and facts that show why we need to do more to support young people and their mental health.

 

Our research

Last year, we did a piece of research to find out more about young people’s experiences of mental health support. We also wanted to know how we can best help them in the future.

We worked with a research partner and spoke to hundreds of young people who had lived experience of mental health problems and trauma.

The research gave us lots of valuable insights which we used to create our plan to support young people.

Some of the key findings were:

  • Young people still don’t understand mental health well. They’ve told us that it causes them to talk down mental health problems that they might have. Because of this, a lot of them also said they prefer anonymous services

  • School or college is where they’d like to go for help first. And when they do, young people want clear information on the help they get. But at the same time, many told us that they usually hold back on what they’re going through at first. That’s because they don’t want to scare people or have their independence taken away.

  • Services need to be quick and treat them as people first. That means support that treats them has a whole person, and understands the trauma they may have experienced. This is really important – our research also found that if 1 young person has a bad experience, it can stop others seeking help.

Key findings in numbers

As part of this research, over 500 young people took part in a survey.

The full report has more information about what we found.

Read the full report

Andthen scoping research survey for Mind

Andthen scoping research survey for Mind

Andthen scoping research survey for Mind

Facts and figures from other studies

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 Source

Finding 
NHS Digital (2020) Mental Health of Children and Young People in England, 2020: Wave 1 follow up to the 2017 survey Young people in the UK have higher mental health need than ever. 1 in 6 young people in England (aged 5 to 16) experienced a mental health problem in 2020, up from 1 in 9 in 2017.    
Office for National Statistics (2020) Young People's well-being in the UK: 2020​ Nearly one-third of 16-24 year olds in the UK (31%) reported some evidence of depression or anxiety in 2017 to 2018. This is; up from the previous year (26%) and the same period five years earlier (26%).
Gutman, L. M., Joshi, H., Parsonage, M. and Schoon, I. (2015) Children of the new century: mental health findings from the Millennium Cohort Study Young people in the lowest income bracket are 4.5 times more likely to experience severe mental health problems than those in the highest income bracket.
Mind (2021) Not making the grade

Secondary schools are struggling to meet the needs of young people with mental health problems. Our research surveyed 1271 young people* across England and found that:

96% of reported that their mental health had affected their schoolwork at some point.
• 78% of young people said that school had made their mental health worse.
• 56% of school staff identified that young people who didn't receive support self-harmed.
• 48% of young people told us they had been punished at school for behaviour that was caused by their mental health problems.
• 25% of school staff said they were aware of a young person being excluded from school because of their mental health.
• 70% of young people who experienced racism in school told us their experience had impacted their wellbeing.


* 82% of the survey sample of young people had experience of mental health problems, therefore they are not representative of the wider population. 80% identified as White British. 87% of young people identified as female, 10% as male and 2% as non-binary.

 
Accenture (2021) University: The Best Time of Our Lives?

Accenture surveyed over 12,000 students during the pandemic on student mental health. They found that:
• 39% said their mental health had declined since beginning university.
• Just over a third (35%) said they were currently facing a mental health challenge.


• One in four of those people had experienced a mental health problem for the first time while at university, but the majority (62%) had experienced mental health problems beforehand."

 
Public Health Wales (2020) Mental Wellbeing in Wales.

More than a quarter of young people in Wales do not feel like they have mental health support at school.
UK Trauma Council (2020) Coronavirus Children and Young People Policy Briefing Around half of young people living in the UK will have experienced at least one traumatic event or adverse childhood experience.
Torjesen, I. (2019) Childhood trauma doubles risk of mental health conditions Experience of childhood trauma doubles a young person’s risk of experiencing mental health problems.

 

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