What do parents know and feel about mental health in young children? A mixed methods systematic review of global parental mental health literacy

Abstract Despite the global rise in child mental health difficulties, public understanding of young children’s mental health remains unclear. Parents play a pivotal role in supporting their children’s mental health and seeking professional help for concerns. Our mixed-methods systematic review sought to describe current levels of child mental health literacy (CMHL) among parents, examine variations across sociodemographic and clinical factors, and explore the relationship between CMHL and professional help-seeking. We searched six databases for English-language studies investigating any aspect of CMHL among parents of children aged 4–12 years in community settings, published in the last decade. From 26 studies across 12 countries (N = 5562), we found that parents generally had: (1) low to moderately low recognition, (2) diverse causal and other mental health beliefs (in Western and non-Western countries), (3) high levels of stigmatising beliefs and perceived stigma; (4) attitudes to professional help-seeking ranging from moderately positive to highly negative, and (5) low awareness of available help. Lower CMHL was associated with lower parental education level, being a father and less acculturated ethnic minorities, while higher CMHL was linked with previous service use. Help-seekers tended to have higher CMHL than non-help-seekers. Thus, disparities in parental CMHL may contribute to unequal access to mental health services. A more holistic, strengths-based and prevention-focused approach to CMHL in future research and measurement would inform intervention. Public health campaigns and targeted coproduced interventions to enhance the CMHL levels of parents with young children should form a key strategy for the promotion of child wellbeing.