Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy: Assessment Tool Development and an Evaluation of a College-Based Curriculum

Students’ mental health issues are a common concern on college campuses and are often addressed via prevention programming called mental health literacy. This dissertation consists of two studies regarding mental health literacy programming for college students at a western university in the United States. In study one, the Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool (MHAA-AT) was created and evaluated for its utility in assessing college students’ mental health literacy. This assessment tool is unique in that it is built upon a process-based approach to mental health literacy. The assessment tool demonstrated adequate psychometric properties and it was deemed an appropriate tool to assess college students’ mental health literacy, specifically their declarative knowledge, self-efficacy, and behaviors. In study two the Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy (MHAA) curriculum was created and evaluated in a college student population. The MHAA curriculum is unique in that is taught in-person or online in a degree seeking program at a college or university. Results from study two suggest that the MHAA curriculum was effective in increasing college students’ mental health literacy scores, specifically their declarative knowledge and self-efficacy. The benefit of this two-study dissertation is that it provides a unique way to deliver and evaluate effective mental health literacy prevention programming on a larger scale via a degree-seeking program to college students

Measuring Mental Health Literacy: Development of the Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool

Background: Mental health literacy programs are a common community-based approach used to address the prevention of mental health issues on college campuses. Current assessment strategies used to evaluate the effectiveness of these programs often lack strong theoretical rational and psychometric rigor. Purpose: The purpose of this study was twofold. First, based upon extant literature, theory, and standard clinical practice, we propose a process-based model of mental health literacy that includes three macro factors—identifying mental health issues, locating empirically based resources, and responding to mental health issues—and three micro processes of how they unfold—acquiring knowledge, building self-efficacy, and applying skills (behavior). The second aim was to test the psychometric properties of a new tool created to evaluate this process-based model—the Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool (MHAA-AT). Setting: Not applicable. Intervention: Not applicable. Research Design: A national sample of 296 college attending participants were recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Participants responded to a demographic questionnaire and the newly developed MHAA-AT. Psychometric properties were examined through item response theory, exploratory factor analyses, and bivariate correlations. Findings: Results suggest the MHAA-AT is a sound measure and demonstrates appropriate item, person, and trait characteristics on declarative knowledge items, and single factor structures on self-efficacy and behavior items with moderate to high reliability and validity. While additional testing is need among other samples, results suggest that the MHAA-AT is a quality assessment tool. Keywords: College students; mental health literacy; item response theory; measuremen

Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool (MHAA-AT)

The Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool l (MHAA-AT) consists of three types of items: 1) declarative knowledge items (30 items); 2) self-efficacy items (20 items); and 3) behavior items (15 items). These items are then divided into the three micro-processes that define mental health literacy: a) identifying mental health issues; b) locating evidence-based resources; and c) responding to mental health issues (see Figure 1 below)

Mental health supportive services during COVID-19: Proposing an online, self-guided Acceptance and Commitment Therapy program for parents in the disability community

Parents of Children with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (I/DD) often experience stress, and the COVID-19 pandemic has likely increased their stress. In the current paper, we describe four things. First, we describe how mental telehealth treatments can effectively decrease parent stress, including programs that target behavior training and those that provide therapy. Teleheath programs are delivered by phone, computer, or fully online. Second, we describe challenges of these programs and explain how online, self-guided programs may help address these challenges. Third, we explain our online, self-guided program based in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). ACT is a specific type of therapy that helps people notice their moods and their thoughts to help manage stress. Finally, we conclude by proposing a call for collaboration to improve and expand our online, self-guided, ACT program

Reach, Adoption, and Maintenance of Online Acceptance and Commitment Therapy at a University: An Implementation Case Study

College students are undergoing a mental health crisis and existing clinical resources at universities may be inadequate to meet their needs. One solution to this problem could be the use of self-guided, online programs for mental health that can be easily distributed to students. A persistent issue, however, is the transition from program development to implementation of a self-guided program at campus-wide scale. We describe, in a self-narrative format, the steps taken to translate an online program we developed based in acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), called ACT Guide, from a research context to a campus-wide service at our university. We also present demographic, previous treatment, and referral data of over 1,500 student sign-ups to describe the reach of our program, how it was adopted into existing university services and systems, and how we maintained the program long term. Findings from these implementation efforts are discussed in the context of suggestions for using self-guided programs for students to fill gaps in mental health service provision in university settings

An Examination of Psychological Flexibility as a Mediator Between Mental Health Concerns and Satisfaction With Life Among Autistic Adults

Background: Experiencing mental health concerns (e.g., depression, anxiety, stress) can have negative effects on satisfaction with life (SWL) for autistic adults. Current mental health supports that may promote SWL do not effectively meet the needs of autistic adults, often due to deficits-based approaches. Methods: To begin addressing the gap in research surrounding mental health supports among autistic adults, we designed a preregistered longitudinal study that used structural equation modeling to assess 289 autistic adults from the Simons Powering Autism Research (SPARK) program to determine if progress toward ones values, a strengths-based component of psychological flexibility, is a potential mechanism through which mental health concerns (i.e., depression, anxiety, and stress) impact SWL. Results: Results suggested that depression (but not anxiety or stress) negatively affected participants’ SWL. However, when including components of psychological flexibility as a mediator, there was no longer a significant direct effect between depression and SWL, suggesting that influences on SWL was explained through participants levels of components of psychological flexibility. The influence of values progress on the association between depression and SWL was significantly stronger than that of value obstruction (a deficit-based construct). Associations did not differ across gender. Conclusion: These findings provide preliminary support for interventions targeting improvements in psychological flexibility as they may help address core issues of deficit-based mental health services while also being able to emphasize outcomes that matter most to the autism community

Data, Code, and Output: Can we move it online? An investigation of effects between in-person and online delivery of a college mental health literacy curriculum

Data, Code, and Output for the brief article entitled "Can we move it online? An investigation of effects between in-person and online delivery of a college mental health literacy curriculum

Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy (MHAA) for Youth: An Evaluation of a College-Based Mental Health Literacy Curriculum

Purpose College students’ mental health issues are a growing concern on campuses across the United States. With traditional face-to-face therapy services often being overburdened, university systems have invested resources into prevention based, health education approaches to decreasing students’ mental health issues. Despite investment, there is not, to our knowledge, an evidence-based curriculum taught as part of a degree seeking program that addresses increasing students’ mental health literacy (MHL). Accordingly, the Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy (MHAA) curriculum was created and evaluated in a college student population. Methods A total of 161 college students (n= 89 control; n= 71 treatment) participated in a quasi-experimental comparison X treatment X modality design. MHL (The Mental Health Awareness and Advocacy Assessment Tool and other related MHL measures) was assessed at two time points (beginning/end of semester). Generalized linear mixed effect models were used to analyze outcomes. Results Results of the pilot study indicated that students taking the MHAA curriculum, both in-person and online modalities, significantly increased key components of MHL (knowledge and self-efficacy) compared to the control group. MHL behaviors did not change in either group. There were no significant modality differences. Conclusion We conclude that the MHAA curriculum is useful in increasing students’ mental health literacy with no significant differences between online and in-person modalities. Future curriculum iterations may benefit from more strategically targeting MHL behaviors to further enhance effects of the course on prevention of mental health issues