Good mental health – experience and concept

The quest for mental health penetrates many areas of life at individual, societal and political levels. The conceptualization of positive mental health is in the hands of a multitude of professionals and scientists such as psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers. Positive mental health has acquired scientific status in different forums, most notably mental health hygiene, mental health promotion, and positive psychology. At close scrutiny, however, positive mental health appears to be narrowly defined by the medical sciences through negation of mental illness, and by the social science through adopting normative Western neo-liberal standards of the good life.

The project’s overall aim is to acquire nuanced phenomenological descriptions and understandings of personal experiences of good mental health, and to place this understanding in a historical context. The research project addresses how various populations, such as mental health professionals, users of mental health service, young adolescents, and health professional students abroad experience good mental health before the experience gets encapsulated in theoretical or political idiom. The relevant historical context for study is the development of the mental health movement and mental health promotion in the 20^th century. The project functions as an umbrella under which participants develop research questions based own their health professional profile. The project also anchors research-based teaching at post graduate studies in mental health work at Telemark University College.