Toward Whole School Mental Health Screening in Japan―A Method to Apply Positive Psychology into Schools

The number of children’s problems related to mental health problems, such as absenteeism and bullying, is increasing in Japanese schools. However, Japanese schools currently have limited tools to provide mental health screening to children for monitoring and preventing their mental health problems, absenteeism and bullying. In dealing with this situation, the authors developed the Japanese version of the Social Emotional Health Survey (SEHS), which is currently used for school-wide mental health screening of children in the US. We conducted surveys to Japanese elementary school students, junior high school students, and high school students using SEHS and other scales that measure students’ well-being. In support of the Dual Factor Model of Mental health, recent studies have shown that in order to develop a comprehensive understanding of children’s mental health, it is important to consider not only children’s distress levels but also their strengths (resilience). In this chapter, we will discuss how the SEHS scales can be utilized for mental health screening of Japanese children with application of the dual factor model of mental health.