Lucy’s research group focuses on mental health and social development in adolescence. In particular, they are investigating whether efforts intended to reduce mental health problems, such as awareness-raising campaigns and school initiatives, may have had unintended negative consequences.
Current research projects are organised into three streams:
Understanding how school-based mental health interventions might lead to unintended harm in adolescents, and who is most at risk
Assessing how learning about mental health problems might change adolescents’ reporting and experiencing of these symptoms, using experimental paradigms
Exploring self-diagnosis of mental health problems in adolescence, attitudes towards this phenomenon, and its benefits and costs
Recent papers:
Foulkes, L. (2024). The problem with mental health awareness. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 225(2), 337-338.
Foulkes, L., & Andrews, J. L. (2023). Are mental health awareness efforts contributing to the rise in reported mental health problems? A call to test the prevalence inflation hypothesis. New Ideas in Psychology, 69, 101010.
Foulkes, L., Andrews, J. L., Reardon, T. & Stringaris, A. (2024). Research recommendations for assessing potential harm from universal school-based mental health interventions. Nature Mental Health, 2, 270–277.
Foulkes, L., & Stringaris, A. (2023). Do no harm: can school mental health interventions cause iatrogenic harm? BJPsych Bulletin, 1-3.
Underhill, R., & Foulkes, L. (2024). Self-diagnosis of mental disorders: A qualitative study of attitudes on Reddit. Qualitative Health Research. DOI: 10.1177/10497323241288785
A full list of Lucy’s academic publications can be found here