Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - UPRIGHT (Universal Preventive Resilience Intervention Globally implemented in schools to improve and promote mental Health for Teenagers)

Teaser

Early adolescence (10-14 years) is a time of many physical, mental, emotional, and social changes. Few developmental periods are characterized by so many changes at so many different levels, when children face the biological transformations of puberty, the educational...

Summary

Early adolescence (10-14 years) is a time of many physical, mental, emotional, and social changes. Few developmental periods are characterized by so many changes at so many different levels, when children face the biological transformations of puberty, the educational transition from elementary to secondary school, and the psychological shifts that accompany the emergence of sexuality. The literature shows an increase in the incidence of mental health problems in adolescents over the past decade.

Nevertheless, not all youths who experience disadvantage, adversity, or exposure to risk factors experience negative mental health outcomes. The concept of RESILIENCE provides one possible explanation for the ability of some individuals to maintain positive mental health. Resilience research gives an overview over protective factors by providing with effective assets to reduce the impact of risk factors, enhance protective factors for good mental health and lead to lasting positive effects on a range of educational, social and economic outcomes.

Research in this area is limited, but suggests that high levels of resilience may prevent the development of mental health problems in adolescents. At present, there are several unmet needs in this field, including lack of evidence-based programmes covering prevention and promotion of mental health in adolescents, knowledge of the percentages of school dropout among adolescents in Europe, data comparability and compatibility is difficult due to be expressed in terms of self-evaluation and short-term follow-ups, and there is a lacking inter-sectorial collaboration between the health, education, social and other relevant sectors with regard to the mental health of adolescents.

Universal Preventive Resilience Intervention Globally Implemented In Schools To Improve And Promote Mental Health For Teenagers (UPRIGHT) project aims to deploy and evaluate an inclusive intervention in a school environment. Thus, UPRIGHT general objective is to promote mental well-being and prevent mental disorders by enhancing resilience capacities in youths, through a holistic approach addressing early adolescents, their families and education professionals. UPRIGHT conceptual framework is structured in four different domains (coping, efficacy; social and emotional learning and mindfulness practice).

Other UPRIGHT objectives are:
- To co-create an innovative resilience holistic programme in schools for the promotion of mental health in youths- between 12 and 14 years.
- To provide evidence of specific resilience factors promoting positive mental well-being longitudinally and acting as moderators of positive mental well-being outcomes.
- To demonstrate the effectiveness and predict future impact of an intervention in terms of improvement of quality of life, mental well-being and academic performance, and reduction of absenteeism and bullying cases.
- To transfer the programme to EU and beyond by disseminating the results and learning and enabling the definition of innovative action plans for mental well-being in the youth.

Work performed

The UPRIGHT project consists of 4 main building blocks:

1) Co-creation (co-design, co-production and co-customization) of the intervention in EU regions. During the months January to August 2018, a co-created manual adapted to regional needs and comprising theory and dynamic exercises to train the UPRIGHT 4 components (coping, efficacy; social and emotional learning and mindfulness practice) has been developed and printed in 7 different languages (English, Spanish, Basque, Italian, Polish, Icelandic and Danish).

2) Deployment of an innovative resilience intervention. The intervention comprises two phases developed in to consecutive school years: Well-being for US (intensive phase) and Well-being for ALL (follow-up phase). The intervention will be evaluated twice in a first and second wave during 3 school years.

In addition to the co-created manual, additional materials are also available (audios of mindfulness, videos summarizing the skills and PPT presentations). All information is uploaded in the UPRIGHT online platform (www.uprightprogram.eu), which serves as a training platform for families and a useful tool for teachers. Activities and events are also announced to the community via the online platform.

At the present moment, the first school year has been completed. The monitoring tools used during the implementation have led to interesting data on how to improve the intervention; also the input from teachers, school directors, families and adolescents have been taken into account. This information has been analysed and a number of changes have been agreed on to improve the 2nd edition of the UPRIGHT programme.

3) Evaluation. Baseline and Midterm evaluations have been conducted with 2,200 European adolescents participating so far; target sample of 5,992 is expected by December 2021.

4) The dissemination of the UPRIGHT project and knowledge is currently an important task for the Consortium and presentations in different conferences, workshops and symposiums have been conducted. A synergy with the H2020 research project BOOST (GA no 755175) was recently performed in Trondheim, Norway coinciding with the 3rd UPRIGHT Consortium Meeting.

Final results

UPRIGHT project ambition is to be the first school based primary intervention programme that will create a real culture of promotion of mental health and well-being, targeting adolescents of 12-14 years of age. Co-creation will ensure that it takes into account the diversity of the different regions in Europe. It is flexible to be able to adapt to the different cultural needs in each region. UPRIGHT school-based intervention will provide effective person-centred care. UPRIGHT is a research-based intervention that will be integrated into daily practice through a well-planned and evaluated implementation process. The aim is to achieve noteworthy progress in adolescent’s mental well-being.

Therefore, implementation of UPRIGHT intervention will directly improve the short-term mental well-being in 3,000 youths (intervention group target). In addition, the all students and the education professionals of the UPRIGHT participating schools (around 24,000 children from 6 to 16 years old) will benefit from the change of CULTURE in the schools. Co-design, co-production and co-customisation of the UPRIGHT intervention will guarantee that this diversity is preserved, avoiding any potential misunderstanding or rejection of the intervention by teachers, families and youths.

UPRIGHT expects to significantly reduce (around 25%) the number cases of bulling, discrimination and violence and will contribute to reduce school and college/university short-term dropouts. UPRIGHT preventive strategy will have a real effect of reducing the occurrence of mental disorders as well as co-morbidities associated later in life. The programme will act and change factors that have a direct impact in mental health, such as unhealthy lifestyles, stress, anxiety and drug abuse.

Website & more info

More info: http://www.uprightproject.eu.