Mental health
A person’s perception of the level of their mental health has direct connection with how they perceive their wellbeing.
Mental health status
This measure shows the proportion of adult Canberrans who rate their mental health as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’ in the past 4 weeks.
Mental health is about more than the absence of mental illness. It is fundamental to our ability to think, emote, interact with each other, earn a living and enjoy life.
In 2024, around half of the people surveyed felt that their mental health was 'very good' or 'excellent'. Men were more slightly more likely to rate their mental health as 'very good' or 'excellent' than women. Adults aged 18–24 and 25–44 were significantly less likely to rate their mental health as 'very good' or 'excellent' than adults aged 65+.
Between 2018 and 2024, the proportion of ACT adults whose self-rated mental health was 'very good' or 'excellent' decreased.
Data source
The ACT General Health Survey data is published on HealthStats ACT.
Chart description
Line graph of percentage of Canberrans reporting very good or excellent mental health, by year from 2018 to 2024. In 2024, 48.8% of Canberrans reported very good or excellent mental health compared to 51.0% in 2023.
Technical notes
This measure was introduced in the ACT General Health Survey (ACTGHS) in 2018.
CALD status has been classified as respondents who reported that they were born in a country other than Australia or that they usually speak a language other than English at home.
LGBTIQA+ status has been classified as respondents who reported that they are gay, lesbian, bisexual or something else. This question was introduced in 2019.
Disability status has been classified as respondents who reported that they have a disability, health condition or injury that has lasted, or is likely to last, 6 months or more which restricts their everyday activities. This question was introduced in 2019.
Health and Community Services Directorate has been conducting the ACTGHS since 2007. The ACTGHS is implemented using Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI).
Statistical weighting is used to address differences between the sample of people who participate in the survey and the characteristics of the ACT adult population. Non-overlapping 95% confidence intervals rounded to one decimal place have been used as a measure of the statistical significance of the difference between two estimates. The impact of this conservative method means that estimates that were marginally significantly different may have been classified as not statistically significant.
K6 psychological distress scale
This measure shows the proportion of people who self-report psychological distress indicating a probable serious mental illness.
Mental illness can impact how people think, feel and behave. It can affect their physical health and finances. While occasional stress is a normal part of life, ongoing psychological distress can have serious consequences for both mental and physical health.
Knowing the level of distress helps us predict the potential demand on clinical mental health services.
We use the Kessler 6 (K6) scale as an indicator of probable serious mental illness at a population level.
In 2024, respondents aged 25–44 years were slightly less likely to report a K6 score indicating probable serious mental illness than respondents aged 18–24 and 45–64, however these differences were not significant.
The overall proportion remained stable between 2018 and 2024.
Data source
The ACT General Health Survey data is published on HealthStats ACT.
Chart description
Line graph of percentage of Canberrans who self-report high levels of psychological distress, by year from 2018 to 2024. In 2024, 7.6% of Canberrans self-reported high levels of psychological distress compared to 6.0% in 2023.
Technical notes
Probable serious mental illness is based on a K6 score of 19-30. No probable serious mental illness is based on a score of 6-18. This corresponds with the score categorisation used by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
If a respondent was missing one value, the missing value was imputed with the mean of the five non-missing values. If a respondent was missing more than one value, they were excluded from analysis.
CALD status has been classified as respondents who reported that they were born in a country other than Australia or that they usually speak a language other than English at home.
LGBTIQA+ status has been classified as respondents who reported that they are gay, lesbian, bisexual or something else. This question was introduced in the ACT General Health Survey (ACTGHS) in 2019.
Disability status has been classified as respondents who reported that they have a disability, health condition or injury that has lasted, or is likely to last, 6 months or more which restricts their everyday activities. This question was introduced in 2019.
Health and Community Services Directorate has been conducting the ACTGHS since 2007. The ACTGHS is implemented using Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI).
Statistical weighting is used to address differences between the sample of people who participate in the survey and the characteristics of the ACT adult population. Non-overlapping 95% confidence intervals rounded to one decimal place have been used as a measure of the statistical significance of the difference between two estimates. The impact of this conservative method means that estimates that were marginally significantly different may have been classified as not statistically significant.
