Awareness of teaching about mental disorders among university students obtaining teaching certificates for health and physical education

: From a qualitative analysis based on an interview survey of senior undergraduate students proceeding to graduate school

Abstract

In the 2018 revision of the High School Course of Study, “prevention and recovery from mental disorders” was positioned as one of the contents of the subject on health. The purpose of this study was to examine the awareness of teaching about mental disorders among university students who obtain teaching certificate for health and physical education of junior high school or high school. In March 2022, using a semi-structured interview method, we conducted interviews of five senior students who belong to the department of physical education at an university in the Kanto region and who will plan to proceed to graduate school in the next academic year. The interview data（utterances） were transcribed and analyzed by the thematic analysis method. As a result, three themes were emerged: “Insufficient acquisition of knowledge about mental disorders”, “Negative image of mental disorders”, and “Motivation to improve guidance on mental disorders”. To improve guidance on mental disorders, first of all, in the teacher training stage, from the fact that mental disorders are a common condition that anyone may potentially get, it is necessary to treat them as a personal problem and motivate students to acquire knowledge on these diseases. In the future, it will be even more necessary to dispel erroneous assumptions on the basis of corrective knowledge and experience and to provide university students with a concept of actual teaching and confidence by presenting specific teaching materials and teaching methods in classes on mental disorders.