Table 1 Characteristics of survey respondents and determinants of using children’s mental health research in policy decision-making, State Agency Officials, Winter 2019-2020, N = 224

  Some college, college degree

34

15.4

  Master’s degree

130

58.8

  Doctoral degree

57

25.8

  ≤ 2

46

20.8

  3-5

31

14.0

  6-9

43

19.5

  ≥ 10

101

45.7

 Skills for research use (range = 3-15)

196

11.2

2.91

  Confidence in ability to find children’s MH research

200

3.90

1.11

70.5

  Confidence in the ability to interpret the results of children’s MH research

200

3.81

1.06

68.5

  Confidence in the ability to evaluate the quality of children’s MH research

198

3.54

1.12

59.6

 Agency leadership for research use (range = 2-10)

221

7.24

1.89

  Agency leadership believes it is important to use children’s MH research

221

4.05

0.92

76.5

  The agency dedicates resources to promote the use of children’s MH research

221

3.18

1.17

42.1

 Agency barriers to research use (range = 3-15)

187

9.66

2.59

  Limited agency resources (e.g., budget deficits)

199

3.72

1.11

58.3

  Lack of time to use research

191

3.36

1.20

47.1

  Unable to access to research articles

197

2.62

1.30

28.4

 Research dissemination barriers (range = 4-20)

174

11.9

3.28

  Lack of interaction or collaboration with researchers

183

3.06

1.18

37.2

  Lack of actionable messages/recommendations in summaries of research

195

3.16

1.15

43.1

  Questions that researchers ask are not relevant to decisions

184

2.90

1.10

29.3

  Unclear presentation/communication of research findings

195

2.74

1.05

21.5