Psykisk ohälsa och könsroller - En kvalitativ studie om skolkuratorers upplevelser av gymnasieelevers mående

Sammanfattning: In this study we aimed to identify and explore different aspects of the school counsellors work with children at Swedish schools. The school counsellor’s assignment at schools is in part to take care of and help the children's mental health within the frame of the psychosocial perspective i.e. for example the social part of the children's lives that sets the condition of their experiences and quality of life. Today's situation in Sweden around children’s mental health has become a much talked about subject in the general discourse, with different views on why and how the situation around their mental health is worsening. We focused on the differences in how different physical genders have normative differences in how they generally express their feelings, are able to formulate emotions verbally and seek help for their mental well being. We conducted interviews with six different school counsellors and talked to them about the phenomenon mentioned above. The discussions and results of these interviews were in part known, but much more of the material that we got out of these interviews became grounds for our continued analysis. The results were that we got a broader view on the already existing data from the earlier statistical reports that were conducted by “Socialstyrelsen” around the subject of children's mental health. That there are more variables to take into consideration in the matter. For example, the differences in the statistical readout for poor mental health between the genders gets distorted when one part of the population generally expresses their emotions differently and it is not taken into account in the collection of data.