Is hope or mental illness a stronger predictor of mental health?

Abstract

Health promotion strategies often focus on the prevention or alleviation of mental illness in an attempt to indirectly promote mental health. But, while the absence of mental illness may be a consequence of mental health, it does not necessarily signal or lead to mental health (Keyes & Lopez, 2002), suggesting that a focus on mental illness may not be the optimal way to promote mental health. The current study adopted a positive psychological approach and tested whether hope was a stronger predictor of mental health in young people than was mental illness. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the proposed model, and data were drawn from a sample of young South Australians (N = 3913; 1317 years). The results indicated that hope was a significantly stronger predictor of mental health than was mental illness. These results have implications for the content of strategies to promote mental health in young people.