Projects

Projects - Young People, Wellbeing and Communication Technologies

Source: VicHealth

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) play an increasingly significant role in the key social and economic determinants of young people's mental health. ICTs create new processes of social inclusion, can contribute to ensuring feedom from discrimination and violence, and facilitate acess to economic resources. 'Cyberspace' represents and increasingly significant sphere for health promotion.

The report, Young People, Wellbeing and Communication Technologies was commissioned by the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation (VicHealth) to provide an overview of the role of ICTs on young people's social relations, in order to provide a framework for understanding the ways in which ICTs impact on their health and wellbineg and to recommend possible initiatives within the Foundations' Mental Helath Promotion Framework. It found that both young people's identities and their civic engagement are profoundly affected by information technologies. Despite this, much of the available research tends to focus on only one type of ICT and to take up a position at one point on a continuum from 'cyber optimism' to 'cyber pessimism'. The report was written by Johanna Whn and Hernan Cuervo, with support from Helen Stokes and Dan Woodman.

Contact: Johanna Wyn