Mental health: Adults

The Scottish Health Survey reports on measures of depression and anxiety symptoms, previous suicide attempts, and deliberate self-harm, for adults living in Scotland, including the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (WEMWBS) for adults aged 16+ years. WEMWBS measures respondents’ mental wellbeing based on their answers to 14 questions with a 5-point Likert scale. The range of scores runs from 14 (the lowest level of positive mental health) to 70 (the highest).

The mean WEMWBS score for adults in Scotland aged 16+ years in 2022 was 47.0 (6.1 MB). This was the lowest mean score recorded in the time series (between 2008 and 2022). For women, the lowest mean score was for those aged 16-24 years, while for men, the lowest score was amongst those aged 45-54 years. There are marked inequalities in WEMWBS scores across Scotland by deprivation (6.1MB). The Public Health Scotland website has more information on the WEMWBS.

In 2022, 27% of adults in Scotland aged 16+ years had a General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) score of 4 or more (6.1MB), indicating potential mental health problems. This is an increase from 22% in 2021. Scores were higher for women than men, and 31% of women reported a GHQ-12 score of 4 or more compared to 22% of men.

The prevalence of adults in Scotland reporting having two or more symptoms of anxiety has substantially increased over time from 9% in 2008/09 to 17% in 2021/22. Similarly, the prevalence of adults reporting two or more symptoms from depression has risen from 8% in 2008/09 to 13% in 2021/22. The percentage of adults who had ever self-harmed increased from 7% in 2018/19 to 10% in 2021/22.

Information on suicide amongst adults in Scotland can be found on the ScotPHO suicide pages.

Adult mental health indicators

Improving mental health is a national priority in Scotland. NHS Health Scotland, now Public Health Scotland, was commissioned by the Scottish Government to establish a core set of sustainable indicators to allow national monitoring of the adult population’s mental health.

The first indicator set was published in December 2007 and consisted of 54 indicators and a cross-cutting ‘equalities’ dimension. Reports and documents describing how and why the indicator set was developed are available from the Public Health Scotland mental health indicators page. The first report on the mental health of adults in Scotland was published in February 2009, Scotland’s mental health and its context: adults 2009 (3.0MB). The report analysed 45 indicators from the 2007 national adult mental health indicator set, covering both the state of mental health and its associated contextual factors. The second report on the mental health of adults in Scotland, Scotland’s mental health: adults 2012 was published in October 2012.

In March 2022, an updated set of adult mental health indicators was published by Public Health Scotland. The updated indicators are grouped by type: mental health outcomes including mental wellbeing and common mental health problems, and contextual factors including determinants (risk and protective factors) of these outcomes (see figure below). A report, Adult mental health indicators: construct rationales (337kB), was published alongside the indicators to give further information about the development of the indicator set.

Figure title: The framework used to organise the adult mental health indicators published in 2022. The number of indicators by domain are shown in (brackets). Source: https://publichealthscotland.scot/media/12202/adult-mental-health-indicator-set.pdf.