Lucy Foulkes
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lucy Foulkes | |
|---|---|
| Occupation(s) | Academic, writer, science communicator |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | University of Birmingham University College London |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Psychology |
| Sub-discipline | Mental health and social development in adolescence, negative consequences of mental health awareness |
| Institutions | University College London University of York University of Oxford |
| Main interests | Adolescent mental health |
| Notable works | What Mental Illness Really Is (…and what it isn’t) Coming Of Age: How Adolescence Shapes Us |
| Website | lucyfoulkes |
Lucy Foulkes is a British academic psychologist and writer, specialising in adolescent mental health and social development. She is currently a Prudence Trust Research Fellow at the Department of Experimental Psychology of the University of Oxford.[1]
Foulkes completed her PhD (2011–2015) and postdoc (2015–2017) at the University College London, before moving to the University of York for a lectureship, and later to the University of Oxford. Besides her research at Oxford, she is also an honorary lecturer at University College London and a senior research fellow for the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families. Her main interests are adolescent mental health, the unintended effects of mental health awareness, and self-diagnosis of mental health problems and its relationship to adolescent identity development.[2][3] She also researches the effectiveness of school mental health interventions.[4][5]
She has argued that mental health awareness may in some cases increase mental health problems.[6] In a publication with Jack Andrews, she has laid out the Prevalence Inflation Hypothesis, which reasons that awareness can lead to overinterpretation of mild distress as a major mental health problem.[7][8]
Foulkes contributes to public science communication and public discourse on adolescent mental health, through media appearances, news articles, podcasts, interviews and books.[9][10] Her first book, What Mental Illness Really Is (…and what it isn’t), was released in 2021.[11] Her second book, Coming Of Age: How Adolescence Shapes Us, was released in 2024.[12][13][14]
