Opening Event for the Psychology Studies Academic Year: Highly Complex Adolescents. Challenges and Intervention Proposals

Rambla del Poblenou, 154-156, Sant Martí, 08018 Barcelona, Spain
To mark the launch of the new Psychology Studies program, the university community is invited to the conference Highly Complex Adolescents. Challenges and Intervention Proposals, which will officially inaugurate the first academic year of this new degree program. The event will address a highly topical issue of great clinical and social relevance: care for highly complex adolescents in the field of mental health. The inaugural lecture will be delivered by Laia Ferrer Tirado, a clinical psychologist, coordinator of the Equip Guia del Barcelonès Nord i Maresme, and author of the reference book Adolescentes de alta complejidad (Herder, 2024).

During her presentation, Ferrer will analyze how complexity during adolescence goes beyond clinical severity and intersects with vulnerabilities in the family, social, educational, and judicial spheres. They are often adolescents and young people who have accumulated a great deal of distress and fragility through experiencing traumatic situations, very often at a very early age, making it difficult to establish relationships of trust and, therefore, to provide professional support. Establishing a bond is key, but it must be built with the particular circumstances of these boys and girls in mind. Innovative and creative proposals, removed from the more traditional care-based model, are being developed within the public mental health network to respond to new scenarios in which the issue extends beyond the field of mental health and requires a genuine approach based on the biopsychosocial model.

This first institutional event represents an excellent opportunity to welcome the new academic year and connect teaching with the profession’s current challenges and circumstances.