CDRF Holds an Expert Meeting on Mental Health of Children and Adolescents

China Development Research Foundation (CDRF) held an expert meeting on the program on mental health of children and adolescents in Beijing. Experts in the fields of psychiatry, psychology and public health attended the meeting. The meeting was chaired by Du Zhixin, Deputy Director of the Child Development Research Institute at CDRF, and attended by Cai Jianhua and Shi Lijia, Senior Advisor and Assistant Director of the Child Development Research Institute respectively.

Fang Jin, Vice Chairman and Secretary General of CDRF, gave an opening remarks. He said that the mental health of children and adolescents has gained widespread attention from the government and the public, and that the Foundation has carried out research on mental health interventions for vocational secondary school students in the past few years. The Foundation plans to explore mental health intervention strategies for children and adolescents in compulsory education, taking into account the challenges and findings from local surveys, and to use scientific evaluations to examine the effectiveness of interventions at different levels, so as to provide high-quality evidence for policy making.

Wang Zhicheng, Program Manager of the Foundation's Research Department 2, briefed the experts on the background of the program and study design; Zhao Lin, Special Term Program Manager of the Foundation's Child Development Research Institute, introduced the programs initiative on capacity-building and policy advocacy; and Wang Hui, child psychiatrist at the Sixth Hospital of Peking University, introduced the content of the curricular interventions and their previous working basis on teachers, parents, and students.

A number of experts, including Cao Qingjiu, Deputy Director of the Child Mental Health Center of the Sixth Hospital of Peking University, Zhang Jintao, Professor of the State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning of Beijing Normal University, and Guo Jing, Researcher at the School of Public Health of Peking University, had in-depth discussions on the program proposal. The experts appreciated the significance of the project and its unique social value and advantages, and indicated that the project would provide high-quality evidence to support the practice of children and adolescents’ mental health education and services in the future.

The meeting laid a solid foundation for the implementation of the program. Du Zhixin said that the program team will summarize the experts' opinions, implement the program in a scientific and rigorous manner, and contribute to the promotion of children and adolescents’ mental health in China.