Strategies for Helping Teen Girls with Their Mental Health Struggles
This webinar is for professionals and caregivers who work with teen girls experiencing mental health challenges, particularly persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and suicidal ideation.
A survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that was published in early February 2023 found that, in 2021 (at the height of the pandemic), 57% of high school girls reported experiencing “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in the past year,” up from 36% in 2011. That’s nearly twice as high as the 29% of males who reported having those feelings in 2021.
What’s worse, 30% of the girls surveyed reported seriously considering suicide, and 13% attempted suicide one or more times in 2021.
In this webinar, Dr. Elizabeth Englander addresses how professionals and caregivers can help teen girls by emphasizing social supports showcasing achievements, empowering women, and reconsidering social media.
Dr. Englander is a Professor of Psychology at Bridgewater State University, where she is the founder and Executive Director of the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center.
Who's Presenting
Elizabeth K. Englander, PhD
Dr. Elizabeth Englander is an award-winning author and the founder and Executive Director of the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center at Bridgewater State University, a Center which delivers programs, resources, and research for the state of Massachusetts and nationwide. She is also a Founding Member of the Social and Emotional Research Consortium (SERC). As a researcher and a professor of Psychology for almost 30 years, she is a nationally recognized expert in the area of bullying and cyberbullying, childhood causes of aggression and abuse, and children’s use of technology. She was named Most Valuable Educator by the Boston Red Sox and in 2018, Massachusetts Governor Charles Baker appointed her to his Juvenile Justice Advisory Council. She is on the Scientific Advisory Board for the Institute of Child Development and Digital Media, and in 2023, her 9th book (You Got A Phone!) was awarded a National Parenting Product Award.
Dr. Englander has served as a Special Editor for the Cyberbullying issues of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry-CONNECT and the Journal of Social Sciences, and has authored more than a hundred articles in academic journals and books. She is also the author of nine books, including You Got A Phone!, the Insanely Awesome series for children, Understanding Violence (a standard academic text in the field of child development and violent criminal behavior), Bullying and Cyberbullying: A Guide for Educators, published by Harvard Education Press, and 25 Myths About Bullying and Cyberbullying (Wiley press). She has also written a variety of research-based curricula and educational handouts for communities and professionals. Reflecting her interest in educating laypeople, Dr. Englander has answered questions in a column for the New York Times (online edition), and she wrote the column Bullying Bulletin Board, which was syndicated by Gatehouse Media in hundreds of newspapers nationwide.
During the global Coronavirus Pandemic, Dr. Englander conducted research with children and educators that has helped to shape the nation’s pandemic response. Between 2020 and 2022, she authored and published five books, one for educators (When The Kids Come Back), two for children aged 8-11 years old (The Insanely Awesome Pandemic Playbook: A Humorous Mental Health Guide For Kids and The Insanely Awesome POST Pandemic Playbook), and two for younger children, all of which both feature supplemental guides and activities for teachers and parents.