Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Mar;66(1):62-72.
doi: 10.1007/s12646-020-00590-8. Epub 2021 Mar 15.

Child mental health literacy among Vietnamese and Cambodian mothers

Hoang-Minh Dang  1 , Ratha Phan  2 , Bahr Weiss  3 , Tung Dang  4 , Amie Pollack  3 , Nam Tran  1 , My Loc Nguyen  1
Affiliations

Child mental health literacy among Vietnamese and Cambodian mothers

Hoang-Minh Dang et al. Psychol Stud (Mysore). 2021 Mar.

Abstract

Background: Parents' perceptions of their children's mental health - including recognition of specific mental health problems as such, and their beliefs about the causes and treatments for the problems - have an important impact on child mental health.

Aims: This study investigated child mental health literacy among Cambodian and Vietnamese mothers.

Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 357 mothers in Hanoi, Vietnam, and Pnom Penh and Kampong Speu, Cambodia. The Child Mental Health Literacy Questionnaire was used to assess mothers' mental health literacy, in particular their ability to correctly identify different mental health disorders, and their understanding of causes of the mental health problems, and about the utility of different treatments.

Results: The overall level of mental health literacy among mothers in these two countries was low, with the proportions of mothers able to correctly identify different mental health problems ranging from 0.17 (Oppositional Defiant Disorder) to 0.35 (Trauma-related). Biological causes and adverse experiences were the most frequently selected causes of generic mental health problems. Medication, parent training and family counseling were the three most positively rated forms of treatment for mental health problems in general.

Conclusion: Although Vietnam and Cambodia are geographic neighbors, varying results across these countries appear to reflect their different historical backgrounds. For instance, the largest difference between the two countries was for trauma-related problems, which may be related to the Cambodian history of genocide. Findings such as this demonstrate the need for contextually developed and focused public health intervention for mothers of children to improve their mental health literacy.

Keywords: Cambodia; Children; Mental health Literacy; Mothers; Vietnam.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Abera M, Robbins JM, & Tesfaye M (2015). Parents’ perception of child and adolescent mental health problems and their choice of treatment option in southwest Ethiopia. Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health, 9(1), 40. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Alfredsson M, San Sebastian M, & Jeghannathan B (2017). Attitudes towards mental health and the integration of mental health services into primary health care: a cross-sectional survey among health-care workers in Lvea Em District,Cambodia. Global health action, 10(1), 1331579. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Angermeyer MC, Holzinger A, & Matschinger H (2009). Mental health literacy and attitude towards people with mental illness: a trend analysis based on population surveys in the eastern part of Germany. European Psychiatry, 24(4), 225–232. - PubMed
    1. Cartwright-Hatton S, McNicol K, & Doubleday E (2006). Anxiety in a neglected population: Prevalence of anxiety disorders in pre-adolescent children. Clinical psychology review, 26(7), 817–833. - PubMed
    1. Chow SC, Shao J, & Wang H (2008). Sample size calculations in clinical research. Boca Raton, FL, USA: Taylor & Francis Group. ISBN: 978–1-58488–982-3

LinkOut - more resources