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Measuring Barriers to Help-Seeking Behavior in Adolescents

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Abstract

To construct and validate an instrument that would measure barriers to help-seeking behavior in adolescents. Method: A 37-item questionnaire based on prior help-seeking literature was constructed to yield a total score indicating strength of barriers to help-seeking behavior. The instrument was given to a sample of 280 high school students following a pilot study of 65 students. Results: The instrument was found to have good test–retest and internal reliability and adequate validity in the tested population. It shows promise in helping to identify adolescents who may be amenable to, and opposed to, therapeutic intervention, and may aid in understanding which barriers to help seeking are most significant in any given population.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Child Inpatient Psychiatric Unit, Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Schneider Children's Hospital, USA

    Josephine Kuhl

  2. Department of Child Psychiatry, and Long Island Jewish Medical Center, Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Stony Brook University Hospital, USA

    Liat Jarkon-Horlick

  3. Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Long Island Jewish Medical Center, USA

    Richard F. Morrissey

  4. Albert Einstein College of Medicine, USA

    Richard F. Morrissey

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  1. Josephine Kuhl
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  2. Liat Jarkon-Horlick
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  3. Richard F. Morrissey
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Kuhl, J., Jarkon-Horlick, L. & Morrissey, R.F. Measuring Barriers to Help-Seeking Behavior in Adolescents. Journal of Youth and Adolescence 26, 637–650 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022367807715

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022367807715

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