Vice-President Darren Maxwell to present at National Gathering in Perth

Darren Maxwell, Vice-President of the Central Coast Shed Cluster Inc has prepared an abstract of a paper for presentation to the National Men's Health Gathering in Perth later this year. Below is the abstract submitted for consideration. 

National Men's
 Heatlh Gathering
2011



The World Federation for Mental Health supports the premise that individuals, in a social and cultural context, are the centre of the caring process.



Care-seeking and care-providing are complimentary activities that provide cohesion between individuals their families and communities. Social and systemic values embody the provision for, and delivery of, community health care quality and sustainability.



The mental and emotional health care need of an individual begins to rely less on family, particularly the mother, as a child approaches teenage years. For young males the requirement that they experience an interactive level of social inclusion with other healthy males is of paramount importance in the development of healthy moral, ethical and social behavioural patterns.



 

Social inclusion begins to play a role in healthy male attitudes as the change from boy to man begins to occur. The years of transitioning from a world of co-dependant child like wonder and imagination to the reality of self determination and survival make the teenage years a dangerous combination of trial and error for many young men.



The Mens Shed movement is ideally positioned to endorse, embrace and promote as a core component of its social inclusion and community engagement strategy, the positive mental health aspects of mentoring and role modelling for young men.



This paper explores how Australian mens sheds can play a key role in the early strengthening of healthy masculine creativity and the development of positive mental health outcomes for young Australian males.

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Abstract: