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Rethinking Youth Wellbeing pp 197–218Cite as

From Targeted Interventions to Universal Approaches: Historicizing Wellbeing

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Abstract

Concern about high rates of mental health disorders amongst young people has underwritten a proliferation of social and educational policy aimed at improving youth wellbeing. This chapter examines educational concerns with mental health through a critical analysis of wellbeing as an object of educational policy and practice. It begins by considering the construction of mental health as an educational problem, in the past and in the present, and the policy solutions that have been developed in order to address this. It then explores how rising concern with the wellbeing of young people has fostered a shift from the historically narrow educational focus on targeted interventions – for students experiencing problems or identified as being at risk of mental health difficulties – to the more recent emphasis on universal approaches and preventative programs. The chapter concludes with some reflections on the seductive power of ideas of prevention and “psychological immunization” and considers the implications of this for contemporary educational policy and practice, and ultimately for understanding and promoting youth wellbeing.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This is reflected in the range and number of studies funded by ACER in its first year of operation. Other projects included studies to investigate variations in the Intelligence Quotient (IQ) of subnormal children, mental tests for student teachers, class grouping and intelligence tests, mental tests for vocational guidance, the relative merits of mental and scholastic tests, tests of aptitude for teaching, standardization of intelligence tests, the prognostic value of intelligence tests in high school, and more (ACER 1931).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Melbourne Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Katie Wright

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  1. Katie Wright
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Correspondence to Katie Wright .

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  1. Melbourne Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Katie Wright

  2. Melbourne Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Julie McLeod

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Wright, K. (2015). From Targeted Interventions to Universal Approaches: Historicizing Wellbeing. In: Wright, K., McLeod, J. (eds) Rethinking Youth Wellbeing. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-188-6_12

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