Persistence of voice hearing in help-seeking adolescents, V2
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The persistence of voice hearing in an adolescent help-seeking population
IRAS ID
306623
Contact name
Gurpreet Reen
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 5 months, 15 days
Research summary
Hearing voices in the absence of any external stimuli, also known as auditory hallucinations, is a very common experience. Around 12% of young people report hearing voices in the general population, and voice hearing is more common in younger people than in adults. Up to 40% of adolescent voice hearers also report voices that persist over three years, and this can have a negative impact in their day-to-day functioning. These adolescents may also be more likely to suffer with persistent mental health problems in the future.
Many young people that are already seeking help for their mental health condition in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) report hearing voices. However, many of these young people do not necessarily meet the criteria for a psychotic disorder. As a result, many of these young people do not get any direct help for their voices in CAMHS but may be very vulnerable to significant health problems if their voices continue to persist.
There is very little known about voice hearing in a younger population, especially for young people also seeking mental health support. We also don’t know much about what makes the voices continue to persist in some younger people and not others. However, we can predict from past research that people who hear voices that are negative in content are more likely to hear persistent voices.
This research will recruit children and adolescents from CAMHS that have reported hearing voices. In this study, we will meet young people to complete questionnaires with them to find out more about the voices they hear and also how they are functioning. We will then follow-up young people after 3 months to find out if they still hear voices.
It is hoped that this study will help us to understand more about experience of voice hearing in the younger population.
REC name
East Midlands - Nottingham 1 Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
22/EM/0171
Date of REC Opinion
26 Sep 2022
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion