Adolescent mental health education InSciEd Out: a case study of an alternative middle school population
Open accessAbstract
Background: Mental illness contributes substantially to global disease burden, particularly when illness onset occurs during youth and help-seeking is delayed and/or limited. Yet, few mental health promotion interventions target youth, particularly those with or at high risk of developing mental illness (“at-risk” youth). Community-based translational research has the capacity to identify and intervene upon barriers to positive health outcomes. This is especially important for integrated care in at-risk youth populations. Methods: Here the Integrated Science Education Outreach (InSciEd Out) program delivered a novel school-based anti-stigma intervention in mental health to a cohort of seventh and eighth grade at-risk students. These students were assessed for changes in mental health knowledge, stigmatization, and help-seeking intentions via a classroom activity, surveys, and teacher interviews. Descriptive statistics and Cohen’s d effect sizes were employed to assess pre–post changes. Inferential statistical analyses were also conducted on pilot results to provide a benchmark to inform future studies. Results: Elimination of mental health misconceptions (substance weakness p = 0.00; recovery p = 0.05; prevention p = 0.05; violent p = 0.05) was accompanied by slight gains in mental health literacy (d = 0.18) and small to medium improvements in help-seeking intentions (anxiety d = 0.24; depression d = 0.48; substance d = 0.43; psychosis d = 0.53). Within this particular cohort of students, stigma was exceptionally low at baseline and remained largely unchanged. Teacher narratives revealed positive teacher views of programming, increased student openness to talk about mental illness, and higher peer and self-acceptance of mental health diagnoses and help-seeking. Conclusions: Curricular-based efforts focused on mental illness in an alternative school setting are feasible and integrated well into general curricula under the InSciEd Out framework. Preliminary data suggest the existence of unique help-seeking barriers in at-risk youth. Increased focus upon community-based programming has potential to bridge gaps in translation, bringing this critical population to clinical care in pursuit of improved mental health for all. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov, ID:NCT02680899. Registered 12 February 2016, https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02680899
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Four of the six classroom-based stigma interventions focused on providing interpersonal contact with people with mental health conditions in order to improve acceptance and increase help-seeking intentions.
“Six classroom-based interventions addressing stigma were identified, two of which used psychoeducation to overcome myths regarding mental illness [101, 102] and four focused on providing interpersonal contact with people with mental health conditions in order to improve acceptance and increase help-seeking intentions [103–106].”
From What are the barriers, facilitators and interventions targeting help-seeking behaviours for common mental health problems in adolescents? A systematic review (2020) · cites this paper as [106]
The Methods > Study design section (page not provided) describes this study’s classroom anti-stigma intervention as combining education and contact programming. The Abstract > Results reports higher peer and self-acceptance and improvements in help-seeking intentions. Our copy does not establish that the contact was specifically with people with mental health conditions or that contact, rather than the combined approach, was the intervention’s focus; this paper also does not establish the citing review’s count of four interventions. (LLM, conf=0.83)
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- Authors
- Yang, J., Lopez Cervera, R., Tye, S. J., Ekker, S. C., & Pierret, C.
- Affiliations
- Mayo Clinic (US)
- Corresponding author
- Pierret, Chris
- Venue
- Journal of Translational Medicine
- Published
- 2018-04-03
- Volume
- 16
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 84-84
- ISSN
- 1479-5876 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC5883586
- OpenAlex
- W2799742487
- Cited by
- 41
- References
- 24
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 2
- FWCI
- 5.08
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Locations
- Journal of Translational Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (UL1 TR000135)
- Mayo Clinic Office of Development (Benefactor)
- National Science Foundation (Graduate Research Fellowship Program Fellow ID: 2013170742)
- National Institutes of Health (R25 GM 75148, R01 grant 5R01HG006431)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health Treatment and Access
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Speech and Hearing › School Health and Nursing Education
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Psychology and Mental Health
- Keywords
- adolescent mental health, mental health education, stigma reduction interventions, at-risk youth, help-seeking intentions, mental health literacy, school-based intervention, integrated care
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Female, Health Education, Humans, Interviews as Topic, Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice, Male, Mental Health, Patient Acceptance of Health Care, Surveys and Questionnaires, Schools, Social Stigma
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