Childhood mental health issues linked to difficulties as young adult

Key takeaways:

• Any childhood psychopathology was associated with poorer functional outcomes in emerging adulthood.
• Of children with mental health issues, 50% had an educational or economic difficulty by young adulthood.

Children with mental health issues were more likely to have poor mental and physical health in young adulthood, a study published in JAMA Network Open found.

“Mental health symptoms often come and go throughout childhood and adolescence, so we do not want to over-rely on symptom levels at one point in time,” Niamh Dooley, PhD, a postdoctoral researcher in the department of psychiatry at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RSCI), and co-author of the study, said in a press release. “We decided to investigate children who had persistent reports of mental health symptoms, regardless of whether they met the criteria for an official diagnosis.”

The researchers used data from the longitudinal study Growing Up in Ireland, an ongoing population-based cohort study that began in August of 2007 and was repeated in September of 2018.

Out of 5,141 participants, 72.5% were classified as having no significant mental health difficulties in childhood. Among the rest, 19.9% were characterized as having persistent externalizing psychopathology, 4.7% as having persistent internalizing psychopathology and 2.9% as having persistent high psychopathology.

Children with any persistent childhood psychopathology were around twice as likely to experience poor educational or economic outcomes (OR = 2.04; 95% CI, 1.75-2.37), poor mental health (OR = 1.97; 95% CI, 1.7-2.28) and poor subjective well-being (OR = 1.97; 95% CI, 1.72-2.26) as adults, the researchers found.

They were also more likely to report social isolation (OR = 1.72; 95% CI, 1.48-2), heavy substance use (OR = 1.69; 95% CI, 1.44-1.98), physical health problems (OR = 1.65; 95% CI, 1.42-1.91) and frequent health service use (OR = 1.37; 95% CI, 1.21-1.57), according to the study.

“Our analysis shows that mental health problems in childhood are linked with a wide range of functional issues in adulthood, beyond the realms of mental health,” Dooley said. “Some groups were at particular risk for specific outcomes. For instance, females with persistent symptoms across childhood, particularly internalizing symptoms, had very high rates of poor physical health by young adulthood.”

The researchers said the findings point to a need for “a wider range of preventive interventions in child and adolescent mental health services.”

“Our study shows that mental health symptoms in childhood can cast a long-lasting shadow on adult life,” Mary Cannon, PhD, professor of psychiatric epidemiology and youth mental health at RCSI, said in the release. “If we understand more about which children in the general population are at greatest risk of poor outcomes, it will help to inform and improve early screening and approaches to support those children.”

References:

Dooley N, et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2023;doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.36520.

New research reveals link between childhood mental health problems and quality of life for young adults. https://www.rcsi.com/dublin/news-and-events/news/news-article/2023/09/new-research-links-childhood-mental-health-problems-and-quality-of-life-for-young-adults. Published Sept. 29, 2023. Accessed Oct. 9, 2023.