Farina, Nicolas, Hughes, Laura J, Griffiths, Alys W and Parveen, Sahdia (2019) Adolescents’ experiences and perceptions of dementia. Aging and Mental Health. ISSN 1360-7863

PDF (This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Aging & Mental Health on 11.05.19, available online: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13607863.2019.1613343) - Accepted Version Download (814kB)

Abstract

Objectives: There is a lack of understanding about how adolescents perceive dementia, and what their dementia related experiences are. Without such information, it is hard to make a case for the need to raise awareness of dementia in adolescents, and the best strategies to achieve this.

Methods: In a cohort of 901 adolescents (aged 13–18) from the South East of England, we explored what the experiences and perceptions of dementia were using a series of questionnaires. Descriptive data of individual items were reported, comparing differences between genders.

Results: The adolescents within this study tended to have positive or neutral attitudes towards dementia, though there was evidence that a proportion of adolescents had misconceptions or held negative attitudes (e.g. 28.5% of adolescents disagreed with the statement ‘In general, I have positive attitudes about people with dementia’). We also identified that the adolescents had a range of experiences of dementia including providing some form of care for someone with dementia (23.2%), though most had indirect contact with dementia through TV and movies (77.3%), or adverts (80.2%). Females nearly always had better attitudes towards dementia and had significantly more contact with dementia.

Conclusions: Considering that adolescents are already forming negative attitudes and misconceptions of dementia, it is important that we raise awareness about dementia in this age group.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	gender, teenagers, attitudes, dementia, ageing, contact
Schools and Departments:	Brighton and Sussex Medical School > Neuroscience
Subjects:	R Medicine R Medicine > R Medicine (General)
Depositing User:	Nicolas Farina
Date Deposited:	29 Apr 2019 09:02
Last Modified:	11 May 2020 01:00
URI:	http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/83424

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