The aim of this doctoral thesis is to – from a child perspective and with children as informants – describe and analyze childhood conditions for children whose parents suffer from severe mental illness. The method used is qualitative – 28 children, 10 boys and 18 girls, 7–18 years old, were interviewed about their parents’ mental disorder; the family situation and their own personal life – in school and during free time. The analyses are based on Sociology of Childhood and Family Sociology. Previous studies have, to a great extent, focused on the risk the children run of developing mental health- and social problems and what helps them to grow up healthy. The increased risk of mental health- and social problems has been well confirmed, but also that preventive interventions can contribute to resilience in the children. Although some studies have explored children’s experiences of their parents’ mental illness and the challenges they meet, research from a childhood perspective, has so far been scarce. The results of this study reveal different degrees of emotional, physical and social exposure for the children. Their childhood conditions were related to gender, relations, communication, problem load and social situation of the family. If the parent with a mental illness was a woman, the situation for the child was often more exposed than if it was the father – most likely due to parental roles and expectations on men and women in the Swedish society at that time. Girls seemed more emotionally involved in the parents’ problems than boys, especially if the parent with a mental illness was a father. Most of the parents were divorced or had never lived together. Parental conflicts complicated the life of the children, who were expected to have maintained relationships to both parents. Lack of communication about the parent’s mental disorder in - and outside the family - was common. The children were often uninformed about the parent’s problems.  If hindered to pass information between and outside their two homes, they were left to handle difficult, sometimes dangerous, situations with the mentally ill parent, alone. The home was not always the safe place for rest and recovery, as homes are expected to be. The heavier the total problem load of the family, the more exposed was the child. Most exposed were children whose both parents had severe problems – mental illness or addiction. They were often placed in out of home care, for longer or shorter periods. The kind and degree of exposure the children experienced varied. Four kinds of childhood sceneries could be recognized: (1) the well organized childhood, where the parent’s mental health problem was mainly an emotional burden for the children; (2) the complicated childhood, where the parents conflicts and inability to protect the child made the child either too involved or too lonely in handling the problems that the parent’s mental illness caused them; (3) the problematic childhood where the parent’s mental illness was not the only problem in the family, but factors like the other parent’s drinking, siblings’ problems, social and economical difficulties added to the burden and (4) the exposed childhood where none of the parents was able to take care of the child. Knowledge and openness, about the parents’ problems, seemed to increase competence and decrease feelings of guilt and responsibility for the parent. All of the children stood forward, not as passive victims, but as competent agents in their own lives – although often more or less powerless because of their dependence of their parents and other adults around them. It was clear, though, that there is a need for professionals in adult psychiatry, social services, school and preschool, to pay attention to the children of parents with mental health problems and see to that they get the information and support they need. Keywords: Children, childhood conditions, children as agents, parental mental illness/mental disorders, mental health knowledge, exposed life situations, competence.

Studien byggde på associationen mellan att de som främst använde sociala medier, målgruppen unga kvinnor i åldrarna 16 till 25 år, även var den samhällsgrupp som dominerade i psykisk ohälsa. Forskning kring varför målgruppen lider av psykisk ohälsa mer än andra samhällsgrupper är bristande. Det är samtidigt känt att ungas uppväxtmiljö spelar en betydande roll för deras psykiska hälsa. Sociala medier inkluderas inte som en sådan miljö, trots att unga kvinnor idag spenderar minst 3 timmar där dagligen. Detta motiverade studiens syfte, att undersöka unga kvinnors upplevelser kring sociala medier som uppväxtmiljö i relation till sin identitet och hälsa. Kvalitativ metod möjliggjorde insamling av material genom semistrukturerade intervjuer i fokusgrupper. Studiens resultat fann att unga kvinnor upplever sociala medier som en miljö lika verklighetstrogen som andra fysiskt anknutna uppväxtmiljöer. Studiens resultat redogör även för upplevelser av psykisk ohälsa i samband med sociala medier, men att en hög självkänsla fungerar som en skyddande faktor. Konklusionen redogör för om det finns bestämningsfaktorer för hälsa på sociala medier, bör dessa kunna betraktas som påverkbara förutsatt att de upptäcks och dokumenteras. Därför föreslås framtida hälsoarbete med fokus på säker navigering för unga på sociala medier. Konklusionen påvisar vikten av att folkhälsovetenskapens forskning fortgår i linje med den rådande samhällsutvecklingen som i studien förstås som digitaliserad, detta för att inte missa värdefull kunskap kring vad som leder eller avbryter kurs mot psykisk ohälsa. / The study’s background was based on the association between those who mainly used social media, young women between the ages of 16 and 25, were also the group that dominated in mental illness. Current research on why young women suffers from mental illness more than others is inadequate. Although, it is well-known that environments that young people integrates with growing up plays a significant role in youths mental health. Despite that young women spend at least 3 hours there daily, social media is not included as such environment. This motivated the study's purpose, to investigate young women's experiences about social media as an emerging environment in relation to their identity and health. Qualitative methodology enabled the collection of material through semistructured interviews in focus groups. The study found that young women perceive social media as an environment as realistic as any other environments they interact with growing up. The results of the study also describe the experiences of mental illness associated with social media, but that a high self-esteem serves as a protective factor. The conclusion explains whether there are determinants of health on social media, these should be considered as impactable provided they are discovered and documented. Therefore, future health work is proposed focusing on safe navigation for young people on social media. The conclusion demonstrates the importance of public health science research continuing in line with current social development, which in the study is understood to be digitized, in order not to lose valuable knowledge about what leads or interrupts courses against mental illness.