Journal articles

We publish our research in peer-reviewed journals. For each article we also produce a plain language summary.

2025

Collaborating with young people: identifying the barriers and facilitators in co-designed research

Authors: Lipton, Dickinson, Bailie, Hewitt, Cooper, Kavanagh, Aitken & Shields

This article explores the barriers and facilitators to meaningfully working with young people in research. The authors find there is no universal approach to co-design. Factors such as resources, communication, process, agency, investment and relationships can have different impacts depending on how they are handled. Table 1 presents a summary of barriers and enablers in co-designed research with young people.

Codesign is the zeitgeist of our time, but what do we mean by this? A scoping review of the concept of codesign in collaborative research with young people

Authors: Lipton, Bailie, Dickinson, Hewitt, Cooper, Kavanagh, Aitken & Shields

This article explores the concept of co-design as it has been used in research with young people. We argue that precise definitions of terms are less important than researchers being transparent about their methods, their understanding of the terms and approaches they are using in research and their justification for undertaking collaborative research.

A global call to action for disability inclusion in health research

Authors: Anderson, Martin, DeCormier Plosky, Ned, Swenor, Bailie, Mathias, Maggo, Omino, Russell & Lawson

A team of researchers with lived experience of disability and caring for people with disability wrote this article. They talk about the challenges to disability inclusion in health research and suggest ways to address these barriers.

Characteristics of geographic environments that support the health and wellbeing of young people with disability: A scoping review

Authors: Alderton, Aitken, Hewitt, Dearn & Badland

This article summarised current research about how different places can affect the health and wellbeing of young people with disability. It looked at key features of someone’s environment which can make their health better or worse.

2024

Coming of Age on the Margins: A Life Course Perspective on the Time Use of Australian Adolescents with Disabilities

Authors: O’Flaherty, King & Kavanagh

This research looks at how adolescents spend their time on activities, education, and who they spend it with. It looks at differences between young people with and without disabilities. This is important as it may play a role in the disadvantage experienced by people with disability in later life. This research found large differences in the way young people with and without disability spend their time. This included spending less time in education and more time alone, with mothers, and on screen-based activities.

Self-harm among 17-year-old adolescents with/without disabilities in the United Kingdom

The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention, 2024

Authors: Emerson, Aitken, Arciuli, King, Llewellyn & Kavanagh

This research looks at self-harm among adolescents with and without disabilities in the United Kingdom. The researchers used data from the Millennium Cohort Study, which followed a large group of children born around the year 2000. The authors found that adolescents with disabilities were much more likely to engage in self-harming behaviors compared to those without disabilities.

Disability-related inequalities in the prevalence of loneliness across the lifespan: trends from Australia, 2003 to 2020

Authors: Bishop, Llewellyn, Kavanagh, Badland, Bailie, Stancliffe, Emerson, Fortune & Aitken

We know from previous research that disabled people are more likely to feel lonely than non-disabled people. It was not known if this had changed over time. This study uses Australian survey data collected across 18 years to find out. It found that disabled people are 1.5 to 1.9 times more likely to be lonely than non-disabled people. This has not changed in Australia for almost 20 years.

Commentary: Bullying and health inequalities for children and adolescents with disability

Author: Tania King

Bullying is a key public health issue and one of the most common adverse experiences of childhood and adolescence. According to a 2019 report on the global prevalence of bullying, 32% of children had been bullied in the previous month. Some groups are at greater risk of bullying than others, and one group that experiences higher than average rates of bullying is children with a physical or learning disability.

2023

Disability and loneliness in the United Kingdom: cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses of trends and transitions

Authors: Emerson, Stancliffe, Aitken, Bailie, Bishop, Badland, Llewellyn & Kavanagh

This study looked at loneliness over time for people with and without disabilities in the United Kingdom. It used household survey data to do this. The researchers were interested in ongoing loneliness, where people feel lonely for long periods of time. It shows that disabled people are twice as likely to experience ongoing loneliness.

Also, there are many risk factors that make someone more likely to be lonely. This study found that people with disabilities have more of these risk factors.

Does employment status mediate the association between disability status and mental health among young adults? Evidence from the HILDA survey

Authors: Shields, Spittal, Aitken, Dimov, Kavanagh & King

This article tells us about the relationship between employment and mental health for young people living with disabilities. It looks at people aged 20-35 years old. It shows that young people with disability have worse mental health compared to those without disabilities. This is partly because young people with disability are more likely to be unemployed.

Health and wellbeing outcomes associated with loneliness for people with disability: a scoping review

Authors: Bailie, Bishop, Badland, Emerson, Aitken, Stancliffe, Ekanayake & Llewellyn

This article gives us an overview of current research. It looks at how loneliness affects people with disability aged 15-64. The researchers were not able to find many studies on the topic. This makes it much harder to understand the issue in depth. They also learned that the tools to measure loneliness for disabled people were not the most appropriate. This is because many studies used tools intended for non-disabled people. We need more research in this area if we want to reduce loneliness for disabled people.

Trends in mental health inequalities for people with disability in Australia

Authors: Bishop, Kavanagh, Disney & Aitken

We already know that people with disability have poorer mental health than those without disability. But evidence is lacking about mental health trends over time for disabled people. This study used Australian survey data over 18 years to look into this. It found a large difference in the mental health of people with and without a disability. We call this a mental health inequality. The study shows this has not improved over time. There is an increasing inequality for some groups, such as young women with disability. This means their mental health is getting worse over time.

A systematic review of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of adolescents and young people with disabilities aged 15–29 years

Authors: Leung, Kavanagh, Quang, Shields & Aitken

This study looks at the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of young people with disabilities. It looked at young people aged 15 to 29. It is a specific type of study called a ‘systematic review’. We use these to summarise the research that already exists. The researchers found the pandemic possibly had a negative impact on the mental health of young disabled people. We need more research in this area to fully understand the topic.