Digital video interventions and mental health literacy among young people: a scoping review

Abstract

Background

Mental health literacy is important as it relates to understanding mental illness, increasing help-seeking efficacy, and reducing mental illness-related stigma. One method to improve the mental health literacy of young people is a digital video intervention.

Aims

A scoping review was conducted to map existing research in the area of digital video interventions for mental health literacy among young people.

Methods

The scoping review was conducted following the PRISMA-ScR checklist. All results were screened based on our inclusion criteria.

Results

Seventeen studies were selected for analysis. In most studies (n = 14), a digital video was the only intervention whereas three studies took a multi-intervention approach. Only two of the digital video interventions were co-created with people with mental illness or university students. All studies showed positive results in favor of digital video interventions in at least one component of mental health literacy or compared to one of the comparison conditions.

Conclusions

Digital video interventions represent effective tools for enhancing mental health literacy. However, there is a need for active involvement of end-users in co-creation and to attend to the production quality so that the digital video intervention is as relevant, informed, and effective as possible.

Keywords:

• Mental health literacy
• scoping review
• digital
• video
• young people
• mental disorder
• co-creation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 A creative arts process, which is used to capture a personal story, using video, imagery, music, and voice (Lambert, 2010).

2 The focus of the videos was on mental illness-related knowledge, such as biological mechanism.

3 A grassroots process by which members of a marginalised group, such as people with mental illness, document and convey their experience” (Tippin & Maranzan, 2019, p. 1), using participant-produced photos, participatory analysis (e.g. interpreting the photos through discussions), and narrative summaries (e.g. explaining how the photos call attention to a specific theme)

4 The video was presented within public service announcements in a commercial television programming style.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, grant number [AH/T003804/1]: What’s Up With Alex (WUWA)? Animated Storytelling for Mental Health Literacy Among Young People.

Elvira Perez Vallejos acknowledges the financial support of the NIHR Nottingham Biomedical Research Centre.