The dual continuum model suggests that positive mental health not only implies the absence of mental illness, but also constitutes an entity of its own. Measures that encompass both positive and negative mental health in young adults are rare. Thus, we assessed whether dimensions corresponding to positive and negative mental health could be identified in a sample of young individuals. Additionally, we explored how such dimensions were associated with potential health-related factors. We obtained data from the Swedish National Public Health Survey 2004–2009 (23,394 women, 18,274 men, aged 16–29 years). We used exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to identify relevant factors revealed by the 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to verify the factor structure. We tested the significance of the difference between effects of potential health-related factors on positive mental health (PMH) and negative mental health (NMH). The EFA for the GHQ-12 revealed a two factor model with negative items that had high positive loadings on one factor and lower negative loadings on the other factor. The positive items had loading trends that were opposite those of the negative items. The fit of this model was supported by the CFA, which yielded a significantly better match than a unidimensional model. When we investigated the associations between GHQ-scores and potential predictors of health, we found that most potential predictors had significant and opposing effects on both PMH and NMH; with the strongest effects from suicidal ideation and perceived humiliation. Our results could be seen to indicate that positive and negative mental health are distinct and complementary constructs. Still, the results of our factor analysis may specifically reflect the wording of the items. We conclude that the GHQ-12 is an appropriate tool for its original purpose, to detect “psychiatric morbidity”. More refined measures, including predictors of health, are needed to assess PMH and validate the bidimensionality hypothesis.

Parenting programs have been highlighted as a way of supporting and empowering parents. As programs designed to promote children’s health and well-being are scarce, a new health-promotion program, All Children in Focus, has been developed. The purpose of this trial was to evaluate the potential effectiveness of the program in promoting parental self-efficacy and child health and development, as well as to investigate possible moderators of these outcomes. A multicenter randomized waitlist-controlled trial was conducted. The trial included 621 parents with children aged 3–12 years. Parents were randomized to receive the intervention directly or to join a waitlist control group. Parents completed questionnaires at baseline, 2 weeks after the intervention, and 6 months post-baseline. To evaluate potential effects of the program, as well as any moderating variables, multilevel modeling with a repeated-measures design was applied. Parents in the intervention group reported that their self-efficacy (p < .001), as well as their perceptions of children’s health and development (p < .05), increased 6 months post-baseline when compared with parents in the control group. One variable was found to moderate both outcomes: parents’ positive mental health. Furthermore, parents’ educational level and number of children moderated parental self-efficacy, while the children’s age moderated child health and development. Having a poor positive mental health, a university-level education, more than one child in the family, and older children, made the families benefit more. In the first randomized controlled trial of All Children in Focus, we found that the program appears to promote both parental self-efficacy and children’s health and development in a general population. Additionally, we found that families may benefit differently depending on their baseline characteristics. This contributes to an existing understanding of the advantages of offering universal parenting programs as a public health approach to strengthening families. However, further research is needed to investigate long-term effects and mediating variables, as well as the potential cost-effectiveness of the program. Current Controlled Trials: ISRCTN70202532 . November 7th 2012.

In spite of a well-developed welfare system in Sweden, there are important health divides between residential areas in Stockholm county, with shorter life expectancy in disadvantaged areas. These socioeconomic and health divides also affect children. Extra efforts and organized collaboration by different authorities are required to meet the greater needs of children growing up in these areas. This article reports on the programme logic and evaluation design of an extended postnatal home visiting programme in collaboration between child health services and social services in the Rinkeby area, Stockholm, Sweden, where a large proportion are recent immigrants and more than 50% are at-risk of poverty. The intervention consists of five extra home visits when the child is aged between 2–15 months, jointly by a child health nurse and a social service parental advisor, offered to all parents of first-born children attending Rinkeby child health centre. Parents of first-born children attending child health centres in neighboring areas serve as controls. The evaluation will use a mixed methods approach, including participant observation, in-depth interviews, interviews using structured questionnaires, review and analysis of child health records and records of health care utilization. The intervention has so far been very positively received by the parents (95% participation rate), who seem to perceive that they actually benefit from participating, and also from staff in child health services and social services who find this approach to be in line with their professional intentions. The staff members interviewed also appreciate the inter-professional collaboration. The intervention has sparked activities also in other sectors (the local library, the open child day care centre) of the local area. The timing of the intervention, at the start of the child’s life, may be well suited to support parents in reorienting themselves and finding a positive parenting role, to the benefit of the development of the child. The intervention may be seen as a concrete example of “proportionate universalism”, as a strategy to reduce inequalities in health – applying a universal intervention with increased intensity in groups that have a greater need for it. The study was retrospectively registered (11 August 2016) in the ISRCTN registry ( ISRCTN11832097 DOI: 10.1186/ISRCTN11832097 ).

Background: Health literacy (HL) is important for individuals in terms of knowledge and competence to make decisions about healthcare, health promotion and disease prevention. Migrants generally demonstrate lower HL levels compared to the majority populations. HL interventions among migrants are rarely studied. Thus, there is a need to find useful HL measurements for multicultural settings. The importance of understanding parents’ HL is related to their key role in providing and promoting the health of their children. This study aimed to add knowledge about the psychometric properties of the HLS-EU-Q16 instrument (Swedish version) among parents in Swedish multicultural settings. Methods: A cross sectional design was used. Totally 193 first-time parents (N = 193) were recruited through two child healthcare centres in Stockholm. Parents were interviewed when their infants were < 2 months old using structured questionnaires including HLS-EU-Q16. For psychometric evaluation of HLS-EU-Q16 instrument, exploratory factor analyses (EFA) were used to test internal consistency (N = 164). HL levels in sub-groups were explored with Kruskal-Wallis/Chi2 tests. Participants’ comments on HLS-EU-Q16 questionnaire were viewed to explore how the questions were perceived by the target population. Results: One factor solution of EFA explained 37.3% of the total variance in HLS-EU-Q16. Statistically significant differences in HL levels were found in relation to migration including language difficulties and level of education of the study population and access to support in line with previous research. Challenges related to understanding HLS-EU-Q16 questionnaire were found among participants with migrant background. Conclusions: The Swedish version of HLS-EU-Q16 could be used together with other instruments for measuring overall HL in multicultural settings. HLS-EU-Q16 appears to discriminate between different levels of HL in relation to migrant background and shorter education and limited access to support. However, other measures of HL which should be adapted to use in multicultural settings, need to be explored in further studies of parental HL and its relationship to child health in multicultural settings. Trial registration: The study was retrospectively registered (18 February 2020) in the ISRCTN registry (ISRCTN10336603).

In recent decades, parents have been involved in programs that aim to improve parenting style and reduce child behavior problems. Research of preventive parenting programs has shown that these interventions generally have a positive influence on both parents and children. However, to our knowledge there is a gap in the scientific literature when it comes to randomized controlled trials of brief, manual-based structured programs which address general parenting among the population, and focus on promoting health. A four-session universal health promotion parent group program named All Children in Focus was developed. It aims at promoting parental competence and children’s positive development with the parent–child relationship as the target. There is currently no randomized controlled trial existing of the program.