MétaCan
Menu
Back to cohort

Young people’s experiences of secure care: A synthesis of qualitative research

2025· article· en· W4411176758 on OpenAlexfundno aff
Graham Walker, Carolyn Thomas, Jason Lang, Helen Smith

Bibliographic record

VenueChildren and Youth Services Review · 2025
Typearticle
Languageen
FieldSocial Sciences
TopicChild Welfare and Adoption
Canadian institutionsnot available
FundersCouncil for Science, Technology and InnovationNational Institute on Drug AbuseLaidlaw FoundationUniversity of Glasgow
KeywordsQualitative researchPsychologySociologyNursingMedicineSocial science

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

Background There is a paucity of literature qualitatively exploring adolescents’ experiences in secure care, which is an essential consideration for future service design. We aimed to increase understanding of factors which contribute both positively and negatively to these young people’s experience. Methods A systematic review was conducted following PRISMA guidelines. Studies were identified by searching five online databases in June 2024. The quality and risk of bias of each study meeting inclusion criteria was independently assessed by two authors using the Crowe Critical Appraisal Tool. Results 26 relevant studies were identified. Analysis revealed key themes: relationships/communication with others, rules and regulations, thoughts towards self and perspectives on treatment plans. Effective care appeared linked to supportive, empathetic staff and a balance between regulation and freedom. ’Peer solidarity,’ based on shared experiences, appeared important, fostering trust and friendship. Transition periods, especially to adult services, were identified as disruptive and anxiety-inducing. The importance of personalised care plans and supportive, therapeutic environments was emphasised, though findings varied across settings and age groups. Most papers were of moderate to high quality. Conclusions Our findings offer valuable insights for professionals involved in design of supportive secure care environments tailored to the needs of involved young people. Future research should focus on directly exploring the lived experiences of less explored populations, such as the impact of neurodiversity or living in the developing world, on young people’s experience of secure care. This would ensure a more inclusive range of perspectives shape effective and compassionate care strategies.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame distilled prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.002
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.000
Version: codex-gemma-dda1882f352aValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Qualitative · Consensus signal: Qualitative
GenreCandidate signal: Empirical · Consensus signal: Empirical
Teacher disagreement score0.142
Threshold uncertainty score0.998

Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0020.000
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0000.000
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0000.000
Bibliometrics0.0000.001
Science and technology studies0.0000.000
Scholarly communication0.0000.000
Open science0.0000.000
Research integrity0.0000.000
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0000.000

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.041
GPT teacher head0.425
Teacher spread0.384 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designQualitative
Domainnot available
GenreEmpirical

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations2
Published2025
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

Explore more

Same venueChildren and Youth Services ReviewSame topicChild Welfare and AdoptionFrench-language works237,207