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Outcomes of the ON FIRE peer support programme for children and adolescents in families with mental health problems
Author(s) -
Foster Kim,
McPhee Ingrid,
Fethney Judith,
McCloughen Andrea
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
child and family social work
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.912
H-Index - 57
eISSN - 1365-2206
pISSN - 1356-7500
DOI - 10.1111/cfs.12143
Subject(s) - mental health , strengths and difficulties questionnaire , peer support , psychology , psychological resilience , coping (psychology) , clinical psychology , social support , sibling , psychological intervention , developmental psychology , psychiatry , social psychology
Children in families with mental health problems may encounter multiple risks to their well‐being. General aims of peer support programmes for these children include fostering resilience and effective coping strategies, and enhancing self‐esteem and social skills. This study aimed to evaluate outcomes from a pilot multi‐site implementation of the ON FIRE peer support programme. The purpose of ON FIRE is to cultivate hope, resilience and well‐being in children and adolescents aged 8–17 years living in families affected by sibling or parental mental health problems. We employed a pre‐post test (baseline and 4 months) evaluation using a suite of outcome measures. The S trengths and D ifficulties Q uestionnaire ( SDQ ), C hildren's H ope S cale, K ids C onnections S cale and P ositive and N egative A ffect S cale for C hildren ( PANAS ‐ C ) were completed for 64 child/adolescent participants. At baseline, participants had significantly greater difficulties compared with A ustralian norms. At 4 months, there were significant differences in c hildren's h ope and in connections outside the family. There were no significant differences in the SDQ or the PANAS ‐ C .