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Mental health

This research project explores decision-making in young people's mental health care.

mental health

Shared decision-making in young people's mental health inpatient units

What was this project about?

How young people and staff in mental health inpatient units understood and experienced shared decision-making. This study took place between 2015 and 2016.

This project was self-funded PhD research.

Who was in this project?

16 young people aged 13-17 and 23 staff, in two mental health inpatient units in England. 

Friends arm in arm - mental health project
Why was the research done?

It is important that young people are involved in decisions about their mental health care, yet there is little known about the challenges and complexities of shared decision-making in mental health inpatient units.

It is important for young people and the staff working with them to understand the best ways of making decisions together.  

What did we find?
  • Shared decision-making requires that the practitioners respect, listen to and take account of the young person’s testimony (their core concerns and inner self).
  • The research revealed that these were the very things that were, in many ways, routinely constrained or denied within the environment and systems of inpatient units.
  • Young people’s ability to be involved in decision-making was severely undermined by the significant constraints placed upon them by being displaced in new, unfamiliar and restrictive environments. This not only limited their privacy and movement, but also their autonomy, reflexivity, inner being and moral identity as decision-makers.
  • The research identified the different ways young people exercise agency, in order to offer new ways of understanding how they responded to constraints and saw their inner self in relation to decision-making.
Team

Researcher

  • Dr Kate Martin

Supervisors