Abstract
We studied Finnish 18-year-old males attending obligatory military call-up assessments in 1999 (n = 2340) and 2009 (n = 4309) on time-trend changes in psychosocial well-being, psychopathology, substance use, suicidality, bullying, and sense of coherence. Subjects filled in questionnaires, including the Young Adult Self-Report (YASR) for psychopathology and the Orientation to Life Questionnaire (SOC-13) for sense of coherence. The prevalence of minor mental health problems in the last 6 months decreased from 22.3% in 1999 to 18.6% in 2009 (OR 0.8, 95% CI 0.7–0.9), whereas severe mental health problems remained stable. Suicidal thoughts decreased from 5.7 to 3.7% (OR 0.6, 95% CI 0.5–0.8). The use of illicit drugs decreased from 6.0 to 4.7% (OR 0.8, 95% CI 0.6–0.95), but being drunk at least once a week increased from 10.3 to 13.4% (OR 1.3, 95% CI 1.0–1.5). Attention problems increased in YASR syndrome domains (mean score 2.9 vs 3.2, p < 0.001) and so did somatic complains (mean score 1.7 vs 1.9, p = 0.005). The SOC-13 scores remained stable. The percentage of males who had studied during the past 6 months increased from 91.4 to 93.4% (OR 1.3, 95% CI 1.1–1.6), while being employed decreased from 64.9 to 49.4% (OR 0.5, 95% CI 0.5–0.6). The positive findings included reductions in the prevalence of suicidal thoughts and the use of illicit drugs, but being drunk at least once a week increased. Self-reported somatic problems and attention problems increased. Despite changes in society and family structures, there were only minor overall changes in psychopathology.
Highlights
There have been significant increases in the diagnosis and treatment of adolescent psychiatric disorders during the last 20 years
Most of the subjects were still living with their parents, living alone increased slightly from 4.8 to 7.0%
There was an increase in the number of divorces in the subjects’ childhood families, from 30.3 to 34.8%
Summary
There have been significant increases in the diagnosis and treatment of adolescent psychiatric disorders during the last 20 years. Hospital District of Southwest Finland, Turku, Finland changes in adolescent mental health at a population level has been inconsistent [1, 2]. A comprehensive review of secular trends in child and adolescent mental health by Collishaw [2] concluded that many studies found that adolescents’ emotional problems had shown a long-term increase over the past 30 years, especially among girls. Increases in mental health care and the use of psychotropic medication have been reported among children and adolescents [4, 6, 10,11,12,13,14]
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