Evidence on cancer awareness among adolescents and young adults remains fragmented focusing on adult populations or the effectiveness of educational interventions. Despite well-established benefits of early detection in improving cancer outcomes, delayed help seeking remains an ongoing challenge. The aim of this review was to explore the current literature on cancer awareness and health seeking behavior among adolescents and young adults. A comprehensive search of five databases was conducted between 2015 and 2025. Findings from 58 studies, representing a wide range of cancer types, revealed that participants demonstrated higher awareness of common cancers but underestimated their personal vulnerability, consistent with the heightened perceived invulnerability characteristic of this developmental period. Common barriers to timely health-seeking included cultural sensitivities, embarrassment, and perceived vulnerability, alongside gaps in specific symptom knowledge. Cancer awareness amongst adolescents and young adults did not consistently translate into understanding their own personal risk or seeking help in a timely manner. The findings of this review suggest that the key challenge is not simply increasing cancer awareness in this group, but subsequently recognising their own vulnerability to cancer, identifying when health-seeking action is required, and overcoming barriers to accessing care.
Autism spectrum disorder poses substantial challenges to autistic children and their families, yet existing reviews of mind–body interventions rarely adopt a family systems perspective encompassing outcomes of multiple family members and relationships. This systematic review and meta-analysis evaluated efficacy of mind-body interventions (e.g., mindfulness, yoga, massage, arts) on child, parent, and household outcomes in families with autistic children. Searching 16 databases from inception to April 2026, 44 randomized controlled trials (2,396 parents; 1,479 children; 36 siblings) were systematically reviewed, with 30 meta-analyzed using multilevel and single-level random-effects models with Knapp-Hartung adjustment. Mind-body interventions were associated with large improvement in parent-child relationship, moderate improvement in family quality of life and parental mindfulness, moderate reduction in parental stress and small reduction in child externalizing problems. A large reduction in child internalizing problems was also observed, though this finding should be interpreted with caution due to high heterogeneity and potential publication bias. Parent-focused interventions were associated with reductions in child externalizing problems, supporting spillover effects across family subsystems. Improvement in parent-child relationship was prominent only in dyads with preschool children. Despite substantial heterogeneity in some outcomes, this review provides the first meta-analytic evidence of the cross-system benefits of mind-body interventions.
Psychopathy in adolescence is characterized by interpersonal, affective, and behavioral traits associated with antisocial behavior, violence, and recidivism, making its early assessment relevant for clinical and forensic contexts. However, unlike adult instruments, the PCL:YV does not include an established cutoff score, which can lead to variability in interpretation across studies and applied settings. This systematic review aims to establish reference values for the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL:YV) by synthesizing evidence from empirical studies assessing psychopathic traits in youth. Following PRISMA guidelines, a systematic search was conducted in Web of Science, EBSCO, and PubMed. After screening and eligibility assessment, 104 quantitative studies published between 2000 and 2025 were included. Pooled means and standard deviations were calculated for total and subscale PCL:YV scores, considering sample type (forensic vs. clinical), sex, and geographic region. Results indicated that most studies involved forensic samples (95
Belsky’s process model (1984) has served as a classic theory for understanding determinants of parenting. However, its focus on between-family differences overlooks the dynamic nature of determinants and parenting within families in everyday life, leaving how everyday parenting is determined unclear. This review addressed this critical research gap by systematically synthesizing evidence from daily diary and ecological momentary assessment studies. Forty-six eligible studies were included, focusing primarily on adolescence (46.81
Video gaming is a routine setting for adolescents’ identity development. Research so far has focused on gaming disorder symptoms or narrow subgroups and separated personal identity (commitment, in-depth exploration, reconsideration, identity styles, clarity) from social identity (identification as a gamer, with a gaming community, or with an avatar). This preregistered review synthesized 34 articles reporting 38 studies of adolescents with mean ages between 12 and 25 years: 21 quantitative and 17 qualitative, 5 longitudinal, with at least 41,404 participants. One survey supplied 82
