This Article Full Text (OnlineFirst PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Walker, J. S. Articles by Gaonkar, R. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Development of a Scale to Measure the Empowerment of Youth Consumers of Mental Health Services

¹ Portland State University, Oregon
² Multnomah County Health Department, Oregon

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: janetw{at}pdx.edu.

	Abstract

Within the field of children’s mental health, there is increasing emphasis on the idea that young people who experience mental health difficulties should be encouraged to take an active role in shaping not only their own treatment but also mental health services and systems. The terms empowerment and, to a lesser extent, self-efficacy have been used to describe consumers’confidenceandcapacityfortaking on thisactiverole.Measures of mental health empowerment andself-efficacyhave been developed for adults with mental illnesses and for parents and caregivers of children with serious emotional or behavioral disorders; however, no such measure exists to assess empowerment among youth who themselves experience serious mental health difficulties. This article describes the development of the Youth Empowerment Scale–Mental Health and provides initial evidence of its reliability and validity.

First published on June 5, 2009
Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders 2009, doi:10.1177/1063426609337388


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?