Focus on child and youth mental health

What challenge do you want to highlight at Almedalen?

“We want to highlight the challenges associated with young people’s mental health and ill-health. We’ll discuss what happens when young people present their own findings to local decision-makers and how to improve young people’s well-being. Our research group CHAP (Child Health and Parenting) has formed a children’s panel consisting of six children aged 4–9 and a youth panel with six young people. We’ll address questions such as: How does it work? What can the children/young people help with? How does it influence the research? And how do the young people themselves experience their participation? Apart from myself, the participants in the seminar include two other researchers who have worked on co-creative research with children and youth, and of course our six young co-researchers: Carla, Cleo, Cazper, Elimar, Kerstin and Sigfrid. We decided that children’s voices should not only be heard but also influence the knowledge we generate.”

Why is this an important issue?

“Well of course it’s a crucial issue for the future. It’s about how children and young people are doing now and in future. The right of children and young people to express themselves on issues that affect them, as enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, is now the law. But what does it take to move from merely hearing children’s and young people’s voices to actually listening to them?”

And who are you hoping to meet at Almedalen?

“We want to meet everyone who cares about the issue, but also everyone who wants to see what young people themselves say when they are given the chance to be involved in the various parts of the research process. The seminar is aimed at people who conduct research or development work for children and young people and are wondering how they could do so with children and young people. They will see examples of what happens when young people help shape everything from the research question to the methodology, analysis, and publication of the results, and they will also have the opportunity to ask the young people what it’s like to be a young co-researcher.”

Åsa Malmberg