Abstract
BackgroundAdolescence is a high-risk time for the development of mental health and substance use problems. However, fewer than one in four 16–24 year-olds with a current disorder access health services, with those experiencing a substance use disorder being the least likely to seek professional help. Research indicates that young people are keeping their problems to themselves or alternatively, turning to peers or trusted adults in their lives for help. These help-seeking preferences highlight the need to build the mental health literacy of adolescents, to ensure that they know when and how to assist themselves and their peers to access support. The MAKINGtheLINK intervention aims to introduce these skills to adolescents within a classroom environment.Methods/designThis is a cluster randomised controlled trial (RCT) with schools as clusters and individual students as participants from 22 secondary schools in Victoria, Australia. Schools will be randomly assigned to either the MAKINGtheLINK intervention group or the waitlist control group. All students will complete a self-report questionnaire at baseline, immediately post intervention and 6 and 12 months post baseline. The primary outcome to be assessed is increased help-seeking behaviour (from both formal and informal sources) for alcohol and mental health issues, measured at 12 months post baseline.DiscussionThe findings from this research will provide evidence on the effectiveness of the MAKINGtheLINK intervention for teaching school students how to overcome prominent barriers associated with seeking help, as well as how to effectively support their peers. If deemed effective, the MAKINGtheLINK programme will be the first evidence-informed resource that is able to address critical gaps in the knowledge and behaviour of adolescents in relation to help-seeking. It could, therefore, be a valuable resource that could be readily implemented by classroom teachers.Trial registrationAustralia and New Zealand Clinical Trials Register (ANZCTR): ACTRN12613000235707. Registered on 27 February 2013.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13063-016-1510-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Adolescence is a high-risk time for the development of mental health and substance use problems
The findings from this research will provide evidence on the effectiveness of the MAKINGtheLINK intervention for teaching school students how to overcome prominent barriers associated with seeking help, as well as how to effectively support their peers
Current gaps in the curriculum and opportunities to intervene some school drug and mental health education programmes have been produced that focus on youth participation and peers as educators [13, 14], to our knowledge these have generally not focussed on exploring the barriers to helping a friend, taught students the skills necessary to overcome these barriers, nor facilitated professional help-seeking
Summary
Government policies and strategies have shifted from a focus on treatment to prevention and early intervention, for alcohol and depression. These studies demonstrated that the programme was both highly feasible and acceptable within school settings [15], and led to an initial reduction in help-seeking barriers and increase in intentions to seek help from formal sources [16] These effects were not consistently maintained at follow-up 6 weeks later, as participants’ helpseeking intentions had returned to baseline levels at this time point. The MAKINGtheLINK programme was designed to address a number of critical gaps in existing early intervention and health promotion activities by teaching school students how to overcome barriers associated with seeking help, as well as how to effectively support their peers This trial will establish the effectiveness of the MAKINGtheLINK programme and, if found to be successful, support its adoption with a national school framework. Anxiety Stress Scales; GHSQ-V, General Help Seeking Questionnaire; ICC, intra-class correlation; ICSEA, Index of Community Socio-Educational Advantage; IMB, Information-Motivation-Behavioural Skills Model; RCT, randomised controlled trial; SPIRIT, Standard Protocol Items: Recommendations for Interventional Trials; SWC, student welfare coordinator; TpB, Theory of Planned Behaviour
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