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Mental health encompasses one’s emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing, and is an essential element of overall health. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) explain that “mental disorders among children are described as serious changes in the way children…

Reflective functioning refers “to the essential human capacity to understand behavior in light of underlying mental states,” whereby mental states encompass emotions, needs, intentions, and desires that can motivate behavior. The construct of reflective functioning emerged in the late 1980s,…

Mental Health America explains that “Good mental health allows children to think clearly, develop socially and learn new skills. Additionally, good friends and encouraging words from adults are all important for helping children develop self-confidence, high self-esteem, and a healthy…

Mental health refers to emotional, cognitive, and behavioral well-being. The World Health Organization (WHO) explains mental health as “a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life,…

The therapeutic relationship, or therapeutic alliance, refers to the purposeful collaborative relationship between the therapist and the client. It is a critical component of effective psychotherapy, and the quality of this relationship is an indicator of treatment outcome. While there…

Communication encompasses both verbal and non-verbal cues, and is fundamental to effective adolescent psychotherapy. Adolescents often have a difficult time accurately articulating their emotions, which can make communicating with young people rather complicated. When working with adolescents, mental health professionals…

A long history in the field of psychotherapy theory, research, and practice has been dedicated to distinguishing which common factors, or characteristics that are present across psychotherapies, are paramount to fostering positive psychotherapy results with adolescents. Empirical evidence identifies the…

Sigmund Freud hypothesized that the relationship between therapist and patient was a key component of effective treatment. Research has since proven that the quality of this relationship is the strongest predictor of whether therapy, including child psychotherapy, is successful. Child…

Mental illness is an umbrella term that encompasses distinct diagnosable mental health ailments, disorders, diseases, and conditions, that involve changes in emotion, thinking or behavior (or a combination of these). The Mayo Clinic explains that mental health disorders in children…

Mental health encompasses one’s emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing, and is an essential component of overall health. Mental health problems in children include a wide breadth of conditions that vary in degree of severity, ranging from mild, to moderate, to…