Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · 1d

ah okay got it, thanks! Ha yes I do try to be careful about these things, even when they get in the way of a nice easy story... so I'm glad that came across 😁

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · 7d

no matter what happened to us. Let me know if you do read it as would love to hear what you think!

3

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · 7d

that move me whenever I think of them. But I also tried to make it a hopeful book, because the resounding feeling i got from writing it was just how brave and resilient young people can be, and that all teenage stories can be re-written, at least in part, by our adult selves...

1 3

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · 7d

oh no!! I'm sorry to hear this but understand (I'm too scared to read A Little Life). If you had a difficult time in adolescence - which we all did to varying degrees - then it will make you reflect on that for sure, and some of my interviewees faced exceptionally tough life events...

1 3

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · 7d

thanks so much for these kind words Julia! Really glad you liked it. Can I ask what you mean about the theories that grind your gears (no shade just want to understand 🙂) - do you mean the overarching theory that adolescence shapes our adult selves and that this may not always be the case?

1 3

Reposted by Dr Lucy Foulkes

Vaughan Bell @vaughanbell.bsky.social · 23d

New from us:

Understanding the countermovement to online presentations of psychiatric disorder that are perceived as "faked" www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

A huge online movement tries to identify people they feel are 'faking' mental illness for reasons of self-promotion.

Understanding the countermovement to online presentations of psychiatric disorder that are perceived as

The self-presentation of psychiatric disorders on social media has generated a countermovement of sceptics who believe some are “faked” for reasons of self-promotion. This has been the focus of a R...

www.tandfonline.com

1 1 6

Reposted by Dr Lucy Foulkes

Isaac Ahuvia @isaacahuvia.bsky.social · Sep 6

Forthcoming in CPS (@psychscience.bsky.social): Are mental illness identities helpful? Harmful? Can thinking you have a mental illness become a “self-fulfilling prophecy”... and how would this happen?

doi.org/10.1177/2167...

🧵⬇️

The Mental Illness Self-Labeling Model: A Conceptual Model for Studying the Effects of Mental-Illness Self-Labeling on Clinical Outcomes - Isaac L. Ahuvia, Bruce G. Link, 2025

Self-labeling with a mental illness, for example, deciding that one “has depression,” has the potential to affect clinical outcomes through multiple cognitive a...

doi.org

1 4 14

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 14

My book Coming Of Age: How Adolescence Shapes Us is out in paperback now

www.penguin.co.uk/books/451093...

Cover of Coming Of Age: How Adolescence Shapes Us by Lucy Foulkes. Out now in paperback

3 12

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

thank you!

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

you might enjoy this book if you're not already aware of it! I'm reading it at the moment - it's basically loads of people being interviewed about their jobs and it's so interesting

www.panmacmillan.com/authors/char...

Is This Working? by Charlie Colenutt

Find out more about Is This Working? by Charlie Colenutt

www.panmacmillan.com

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

Out on Thursday, available to order now:

www.penguin.co.uk/books/451093...

Coming of Age

What we experience during adolescence shapes us for life, but psychologist Lucy Foulkes shows that too often we fear, dismiss or even try to prevent aspects of it that are crucial to our development. ...

www.penguin.co.uk

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

Coming Of Age is about how adolescent memories pack such an emotional punch and how they shape our adult lives — but also about how the narrative about them has room for change, about how the stories we tell about our adolescent selves can always be re-written

1 1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

I’m especially grateful for David’s review here - all positive reviews are lovely of course, but this one felt particularly special because I felt like he really captured what I hoped the book was about...

2

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 7

I had no idea about this list so this was such a nice surprise when a pal spotted this and sent it to me yesterday 🥹 — Coming Of Age is one of the Guardian’s best paperbacks out this month

www.theguardian.com/books/ng-int...

The Guardian This month’s best paperbacks July

1 1 10

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

I've had some really helpful messages on Instagram about this - resharing here in case it can reach more people

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

How do autistic young people experience universal mental health interventions at school?

Please read/share this 🙏

A mum recently got in touch with me to share a story about her autistic daughter’s experience of mental health lessons in school

(🧵)

1 1 2

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

If you have any experience to share, even if just one anecdote as I have done here – please do get in touch here or via email. I think there’s possibly a problem here that really needs to be addressed so would love to hear from you to better understand what I can do to help

Thank you

(end)

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

If not, can we put our heads together and figure out how to answer this? If you’re working in this area, or know of research, or want to start working on this – please get in touch either here or via email. Maybe we can have a researcher meeting over the summer to figure out some next steps

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

Pretty much every universal intervention that’s ever been delivered will have had at least some autistic young people in this class. So: do we know about their experience? Has any research investigated this, either qualitative or quantitatively? This is something we urgently need to understand

2 2

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

Every autistic person is different, but I’m wondering if there is a pattern here - whether some fundamental aspects of autism means that universal mental health lessons are problematic/harmful. Compounding this, of course, is that autistic young people are at elevating risk of MH problems anyway

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

I want to understand this better. Is J the only autistic person to have been confused by the messaging in these lessons, or to become fixated on whether certain labels applied to them? Has anyone had any experience of this as a parent or teacher?

1 1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

Her mum told me it became difficult to question or untangle the beliefs that J had become fixated on during these lessons

1 1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

In her mum’s words, mental illness/mental health problems became something akin to a restrictive and repetitive interest for J – she saw similarity between J's obsessive interest in this topic and her previous intense interests

1 1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

But she also looked up to and admired the teacher who has been brought in to give these lessons. She became very interested in the possibility that she had a mental illness, and told her mum that she did

1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

J became very interested in, and very confused by, the content of these lessons. She was confused by the overlap between ‘the mental health spectrum’ and the ‘autism spectrum’ that she knew herself to be on

1 1

Dr Lucy Foulkes @lucyfoulkes.bsky.social · Jul 4

This autistic girl (J) had a series of mental health lessons from an external provider. As is pretty standard, she learnt about how MH problems exist on a spectrum, that there is something called mental illness, and that mental health problems and mental illness are very common in her age group

1