Professor Mary Cannon is Professor of Psychiatric Epidemiology and Youth Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry, RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Ireland and a consultant psychiatrist in Beaumont Hospital, Dublin. Her areas of research interest are young people’s mental health and early life risk and protective factors for later mental disorders particularly schizophrenia. Her research is funded by the European Research Council and the Health Research Board (Ireland). Professor Cannon is interested in advocacy in the field of mental health and has served on a governmental Task Force on Youth Mental Health and a ministerial rapid response group on Substance Use in Third Level Students. She is vice -chair of the Youth and Student Psychiatry Faculty in the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland. She is a member of the Editorial Boards for the British Journal of Psychiatry, Schizophrenia Bulletin and the Irish Journal of Psychological Medicine.