Risk and Protective Factors for Promoting Psychological Health and Preventing Psychological Disorders in Emerging Adulthood

Dear Colleagues,

As Guest Editors, we are pleased to announce this Special Issue of the journal Healthcare titled “Risk and Protective Factors for Promoting Psychological Health and Preventing Psychological Disorders in Emerging Adulthood”.

In the last decade, growing research attention was given to youth and young adults’ mental health. Previous research carried out among this specific population across the world has revealed, even before the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing rates of psychological disease, including—but not limited to—anxiety, depression, and somatization. Indeed, emerging adulthood represents a critical turning point due to the different changes and challenges to be faced, i.e., the transition from adolescence to adulthood; the restructuring of the social network by the inclusion of new relationships; the adjustment to new demands; the development and implementation of plans (for future personal and professional life).

Moreover, along with the psychological impact of the two years of the pandemic, within the contemporary age, achieving independence is a more complex path than at any other point in history.

Therefore, new research efforts addressing individual, situational, and relational risk and protective factors influencing psychological health in youth and young adults are highly required. This will allow the development of tailored evidence-based interventions that effectively foster psychological health and prevent psychopathological risk in youth and young adults.

This Special Issue seeks original high-quality research targeting youth and young adults in different contexts (e.g., family context;  academic context; work context). Older adults can be included as a comparison group. Moderation and mediation analyses are particularly welcome. Development and validation studies of new measurement tools, systematic reviews and/or meta-analyses, policy and practice reviews, perspectives, clinical trials, case reports, and brief research reports are also welcome.

Dr. Federica Vallone
Prof. Dr. Maria Clelia Zurlo
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Healthcare is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• emerging adulthood
• youth/young adults
• prevention
• psychopathology
• mental health
• risk factors
• protective factors
• mediation/moderation