Publications by authors named "Mauri Marttunen"

Article Synopsis
  • Symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and social anxiety disorder (SAD) among adolescents are rising, prompting this study to explore how lifestyle factors affect their prevalence.
  • The research analyzed data from over 130,000 Finnish students aged 14-18, using established questionnaires to identify anxiety symptoms and employing logistic regression models for analysis.
  • Results indicated strong links between excessive internet use and reduced sleep with GAD, while SAD was associated with both heavy internet use and insufficient physical activity, highlighting the need for targeted health interventions.
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Background: We examined exposure to adulthood traumatic life events (TLEs) and their associations with depression in women and men. Then we examined whether those associations are independent of exposure loading and vulnerability including familial confounding.

Methods: The fourth survey in 2011 of the population-based Finnish Twin Cohort had 8410 participants (45 % men, mean age 60 years).

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Background: Psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) are common in clinical adolescent samples and form a continuum based on their frequency and intensity. PLEs can have harmful effects on both behaviour and affect.

Methods: Prevalence and subjective distress due to PLEs were assessed with the Prodromal Questionnaire-Brief (PQ-B) and depressive symptoms with the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-21A) among adolescents ( = 399; 71.

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Background: High levels of mental health problems among young people were reported during the COVID-19 pandemic, but studies of the post-pandemic period are scarce. We assessed mental health problems among Finnish youth before, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic using nationwide population-based samples. Our aim was to examine in which direction the heightened levels of adolescent mental health problems have developed after the pandemic.

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Introduction: Relatively little is known about whether the association between smoking and depressive symptoms changes with age and how the trajectories of smoking and depressive symptoms are intertwined during the life course. In this population-based study, these associations were examined from young adulthood to middle age.

Methods: Participants of a Finnish cohort study (N = 1955) were assessed at the ages of 22, 32, 42, and 52 using questionnaires covering daily smoking (yes/no) and the short 13-item Beck Depression Inventory.

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Introduction: Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), marked by excessive worry, and social anxiety disorder (SAD) are among the clinically most important anxiety disorders in the adolescent population. This study aimed to explore the associations between perceived difficulties in school and heightened levels of self-reported noncomorbid and comorbid GAD and SAD symptoms.

Methods: Survey data of 37,905 Finnish upper secondary school students with a mean age of 17.

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Article Synopsis
  • The Finnish Medical Journal changed their review process from single-blind to double-blind in 2017 to see how it would affect reviews of scientific papers.
  • They found that when it was double-blind, experts were less likely to recommend papers for acceptance or minor changes, but more likely to suggest major changes or rejection.
  • Overall, double-blind reviews had better quality ratings compared to single-blind ones, meaning they were considered more helpful.
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Article Synopsis
  • A one-year follow-up study aimed to assess healthcare costs and changes in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) among adolescents with three types of psychiatric disorders: behavioral and emotional, mood, and anxiety disorders.
  • The study involved 106 adolescents who filled out an HRQoL questionnaire upon entering psychiatric outpatient clinics and at a follow-up, while comparison was made to a control group of 373 peers.
  • Findings showed no significant difference in healthcare costs across the disorder groups, but mood disorder patients experienced a noteworthy improvement in HRQoL, highlighting that healthcare costs do not always correlate with treatment quality.
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Aim: Psychosis-Like Experiences (PLEs) and depressive symptoms are correlated in clinical adolescent populations. However, symptom-level associations between the two phenomena are not clear.

Methods: We analysed factor structures of a PLE instrument, the Prodromal Questionnaire-Brief (PQ-B), based on dimensions of positive symptoms of schizophrenia, and a depression measurement instrument, the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-21A) and performed a network analysis of item-level associations between the two measures.

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Background: Alarming levels of emotional symptoms among youth were reported during the COVID-19 pandemic. Studies assessing these figures against the pre-pandemic developments are rare. We examined the trend of generalized anxiety (GA) in adolescents in the 2010s and the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic against this trend.

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Sociodemographic and psychosocial family factors have profound implications for adolescent development, identity formation and mental health during the adolescent years. We explored the associations of sociodemographic and psychosocial family factors with transgender identity in adolescence and the role of these factors in the associations between gender identity and emotional disorders. Data from a large adolescent population survey from Finland were analysed using logistic regression models.

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Research on the predictors of outcome for early, community-based, and time-limited interventions targeted for clinical depression in adolescents is still scarce. We examined the role of demographic, psychosocial, and clinical variables as predictors of outcome in a trial conducted in Finnish school health and welfare services to identify factors associating to symptom reduction and remission after a brief depression treatment. A total of 55 12-16-year-olds with mild to moderate depression received six sessions of either interpersonal counseling for adolescents (IPC-A) or brief psychosocial support (BPS).

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Purpose Of The Study: To study in an adolescent clinical inpatient population how clinical, background and psychological factors differ between adolescents referred voluntarily or involuntarily.

Methods: In this prospective cohort study, we compared adolescents (age 13-17 years,  = 206) who had been referred to psychiatric hospitalization for the first time in their life either voluntarily ( = 144) or involuntarily ( = 62). We gathered from clinical records data on the source, mode and reason for referral as well as on whether after referral the subjects were admitted to the hospital voluntarily or not, and whether they were committed to involuntary hospitalization after the observation period.

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Article Synopsis
  • A Finnish cohort study examined the relationship between smoking and depressive symptoms from young adulthood to middle age, focusing on participants aged 22 to 52.
  • Results showed that while daily smoking decreased over time, depressive symptoms increased, particularly in men, and the link between smoking and depression was stronger in this group.
  • The study identified four distinct trajectories for smoking and depressive symptoms and highlighted that persistent smoking is associated with a higher risk of experiencing significant depressive symptoms, especially in men.
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Purpose: This cohort profile describes the Stress, development and mental health study (TAM), which is a cohort study investigating risk and protective factors as well as longitudinal associations regarding mental health and well-being from adolescence to midlife. This interdisciplinary cohort study operates, for example, in the fields of public health, social medicine, psychiatry and the life course perspective.

Participants: In 1981 (n=2242, 98.

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Background: The COVID-19-pandemic and especially the physical distancing measures drastically changed the conditions for providing outpatient care in adolescent psychiatry.

Methods: We investigated the outpatient services of adolescent psychiatry in the Helsinki University Hospital (HUH) from 1/1/2015 until 12/31/2020. We retrieved data from the in-house data software on the number of visits in total and categorized as in-person or remote visits, and analysed the data on a weekly basis.

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The aim of this study was to examine the congruence of adolescent- and therapist-rated therapeutic alliance, and to explore which rating or combination of ratings would predict treatment outcome or premature termination. We also studied whether the alliance changes over the course of treatment and if the change is related to the outcome or dropout. This study comprised 58 adolescents clinically referred for psychotherapeutic interventions.

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Background: Mental health problems are common in adolescence and seeking help for them is becoming more common. Referrals to adolescent mental healthcare have recently increased in Finland.

Objective: To examine time trends in internalizing and externalizing mental health symptoms among Finnish adolescents.

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Objective: We assessed the detection, treatment and outcomes of DSM-5 eating disorders in a nationwide community setting.

Method: The FinnTwin12 cohort comprises twins born in 1983-1987 in Finland (n = 5,600), with follow-up starting at age 12. We outline treatment and outcomes of the 127 females and 15 males diagnosed with a lifetime DSM-5 eating disorder in interviews conducted for a subsample (n = 1,347) in their early 20s.

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Background: Psychological distress refers to non-specific symptoms of stress, anxiety and depression, and it is more common in women. Our aim was to investigate factors contributing to psychological distress in the working population, with a special reference to gender differences.

Methods: We used questionnaire data from the nationally representative Finnish Regional Health and Well-being Study (ATH) collected in the years 2012-2016 (target population participants aged 20 +, n = 96,668, response rate 53%), restricting the current analysis to those persons who were working full-time and under 65 of age (n = 34,468).

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Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of psychotherapeutic interventions for clinically referred adolescents, as well as to examine whether sociodemographic, clinical, or treatment-related variables and patients' role expectations predict treatment outcome or are possible predictors of treatment dropout.

Method: The study comprised 58 adolescents (mean age 14.2, 65.

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Background: Sexuality is a major facet of development during adolescence. Apace with normal sexual development, sexual experiences become more common and intimate. Recent research reports mixed results as to whether this is the case among transgender identifying adolescents.

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Background: Despite reduced sanctions and more permissive attitudes toward cannabis use in the USA and Europe, the prevalences of adolescent cannabis use have remained rather stable in the twenty-first century. However, whether trends in adolescent cannabis use differ between socioeconomic groups is not known. The aim of this study was to examine trends in cannabis use according to socioeconomic status among Finnish adolescents from 2000 to 2015.

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Aim: The Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) has been validated for use with adolescents to screen their harmful alcohol consumption. How well AUDIT or its derivative consumption version AUDIT-C predicts the development of problematic alcohol use among adolescents remains unknown. The aim of our study was to examine the predictive capacity of AUDIT and AUDIT-C among adolescents in a one-year follow-up.

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