Effect of summer holiday programs on children’s mental health and wellbeing (MEDLINE).

Abstract

Abstract The "summer holiday slide" has been documented in academic literature for more than a century, describing the reduction in academic achievement that children experience over the extended summer holiday period. More recently, attention has been turned to the impact of the extended summer holiday on other aspects of children's health and wellbeing. During school holidays, children spend more time in sedentary behaviours, particularly in screen-based activities, less physical activity and changes in sleep patterns. Greater amounts of screen time has been positively associated with mental distress and negatively with psychological wellbeing. Greater levels of physical activity is associated with lower levels of depression and improved aspects of self-esteem and self-concept in children. The summer holidays are typically the longest school holiday period of the year, during which unhealthy patterns of behaviours can have the biggest cumulative impact when compared to the school year. The "Structured Day Hypothesis" posits that days filled with compulsory, planned and appropriately supervised activities, such as the school day, can somewhat control the obesogenic behaviours of children. During the summer holidays, summer programs may provide structures beneficial to the health of children. Further, there are unique challenges and concerns presented during school holidays for socially disadvantaged, low-income families including access to appropriate childcare, the ability to provide enrichment activities, financial pressures and access to quality food. Access to resources and positive experiences through the school holiday period may at least partially mitigate the extent to which disadvantage is associated with poorer health. Summer holiday programs may offer an avenue for intervention to close the high-low SES gaps in physical health as well as cognitive, social, emotional, mental health and wellbeing outcomes. A synthesis of the evidence regarding the impact of summer holiday interventions on outcomes related to mental and physical health and wellbeing will be useful in the design of interventions and policies to improve the health and wellbeing of children now and potentially addressing health inequality.