Projects Funded in Round 3

Read the key findings and outputs from these projects:

• Understanding the impact of digital parenting across diverse family ecologies

• Using social media influencers as a first-line digital intervention to improve mental health among adolescent girls at scale

• Well-being and the digital worlds of unaccompanied refugee children and young people (URCYP)

• The ‘Third Space’ School Library: Fostering Digital Capability for Young People’s Mental Health

• Influencer Culture in the Digital Age: From Princesses to ‘Post’ Envy

• Enabling Creativity Through Inclusive Co-Design in Game Making to Promote Positive Mental Health Outcomes

• Connecting Online Mental Health Services with Schools (COMS): What are the risks and opportunities?

• Identifying Protective and Risk Behaviour Patterns of Online Communication in Young People

Click here for details of Round 1 and Round 2 projects.

Understanding the impact of digital parenting across diverse family ecologies

Lead applicant: Dr Amy Orben, MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge

Co-applicants/partners:
Dr Rachel Goldberg, University of California Irvine, USA
Dr Kathryn Modecki, Griffith University, Australia
Vicki Shotbolt, Parent Zone
Cliff Manning, Parent Zone

Grant awarded: £24934

Duration: 6 months

Project summary
Current conceptualisations and measurements of digital parenting are outdated and pay scant attention to the diversity of digital parenting behaviours. Over the past five years, our team analysed various literatures to create a new way of measuring digital parenting, accounting for its diverse forms across different socioeconomic backgrounds. Published in Perspectives on Psychological Science by Modecki et al., our validation process established a six-dimensional scale covering rule-setting, mediation, technological monitoring, monitoring by proxy, co-use, and boundary negotiation. This grant aimed to explore how these digital parenting behaviours relate to family structure and well-being, in partnership with Parent Zone NGO, involving parents and youth in co-design.

We have made substantial progress on this aim, however we also faced some challenges. For example, we found a coding error in our initial scale validation, meaning that the final part of the scale validation had to be re-done, delaying our progress and adjusting our objectives. Our objectives achieved are the following:

1. Address current gap in mental health research by validating a new scale measuring digital parenting that incorporates diverse family and parenting ecologies.

2. Obtain input about the scale and how it can be used by two co-creation teams of children and parents three times each across the grant period.

3. Study how digital parenting as measured with the scale relates to child age, child gender, the number of children in the home, the presence of older vs younger siblings, and the number of adults in the home through a high-quality pre-registered study with open materials and code.

4. Provide a continuous pathway to impact by communicating with policy partners and stakeholders, while informing new grant applications and approaches.

Reference

Modecki, K. L., Goldberg, R. E., Wisniewski, P., & Orben, A. (2022). What Is Digital Parenting? A Systematic Review of Past Measurement and Blueprint for the Future. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 17(6), 1673–1691. https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916211072458

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

Across the first three studies we developed and validated the Digital Parenting Questionnaire. The final version includes 32 items, loading onto six distinct factors (i.e., mediation, authoritarianism, boundary negotiation, monitoring by proxy, technological monitoring, co-use). The scale incorporates important elements of digital parenting that have been overlooked in previous scales used to examine parenting practices. This makes the Digital Parenting Questionnaire more suitable for researching parenting practices in a digitalised world, where technology takes a central role in the everyday lives of children and parents. Contrasting the predictions of parents and children in the co-creation groups, initial analyses suggest no major differences in parenting practices across birth order or gender of the child. Overall, the age of the child appeared to be the most robust predictor of parenting practices. For instance, a decrease in number of parenting practices was observed with increasing age of the child, a trend driven by the reduction of technological monitoring behaviour and authoritarianism. Altogether, these findings illustrate the utility of the Digital Parenting Questionnaire in examining parenting in the 21st century.

Using social media influencers as a first-line digital intervention to improve mental health among adolescent girls at scale

Lead applicant: Prof Phillippa Diedrichs, University of the West of England

Co-applicants/partners:
Dr Nicole Paraskeva, University of the West of England
Dr Dasha Nicholls, Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine
Prof Mireille Toledano, Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine
Natasha Lipman, Social Media Influencer and Journalist
Stacie Shelton, Dove Self Esteem Project, Unilever Global Head of Education and Advocacy
Lynsey Smith, Unilever Global Senior Influence Manager
Antony Genova, Google (YouTube)

Grant awarded: £14,516

Duration: 6 months

Project summary
Via a world-first collaboration among adolescents, academics, social media influencers (SMIs), and technology and media companies (Google, Dove), we will pioneer a new approach to delivering mental health interventions to teens. Ensuring reach and engagement, we’re task-shifting intervention delivery from health professionals and teachers to popular SMIs, who will publish video blogs (vlogs) containing evidence-based techniques to thousands of loyal viewers on YouTube, the most popular social media platform for UK teens. Over half of UK teens watch SMIs on YouTube. SMIs offer a unique way to reach teens but have not been utilised for delivering mental health interventions. Our vlogs will address body image, a pressing issue teens say they’re facing, affecting over 60% of girls2, and a linchpin developmental risk factor for depression, eating disorders, self-harm and substance misuse.

Our aims were to:

1. Adapt techniques from an evidence-based school intervention, proven to be acceptable and effective in improving adolescent body image (Diedrichs 20153; 20214) to deliver via vlogs.

2. Assemble a group of adolescent girls and SMIs to participate in focus groups to inform the design of the vlogs.

3. Host a 1-day workshop with girls, SMIs, academics and industry to co-design the vlogs.

References

Ofcom (2019). Media nations: UK. Available from https://www.ofcom.org.uk/data/assets/pdf_file/0019/160714/media-nations-2019-uk-report.pdf

Dove (2017). Girls and Beauty Confidence: The UK. London

Diedrichs, P.C., Atkinson, M.J., Steer, R., Garbett, K.M., Rumsey, N., & Halliwell, E. (2015). Dove Confident Me: Single Session when delivered by teachers and researchers: Results for a cluster randomised controlled trial. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 74, 94-104.

Diedrichs, P. C., Atkinson, M. J., Garbett, K. M., & Leckie, G. (2021). Evaluating the “dove confident me” five-session body image intervention delivered by teachers in schools: a cluster randomized controlled effectiveness trial. Journal of Adolescent Health, 68(2), 331-341.

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

Our findings strongly suggest that vlogs delivered by social media influencers (SMIs) could be a popular, accessible, and effective way to deliver first-line mental health interventions focused on body image to teens. They suggest that vlogs should be co-created (and potentially co-delivered) with experts in psychology and body image, and care should be made to deliver clear messaging, present trigger warnings, and drive traffic to the vlogs across other platforms.

Below are some key findings:

1. There was a strong sense among adolescents that SMIs should be able to relate body image to their own lives and experiences. This was echoed by content creators who expressed feeling more comfortable sharing body image-related personal experiences. SMIs emphasised the importance of following their own creative process to deliver content that is true to them. This mirrored young people’s views that authentic content is most impactful.

2. Many SMIs want to collaborate with experts (e.g., psychologists/body image researchers) to create content on body image outside of sharing their own experiences. A handful of young people also mentioned the advantages of creators working with experts to deliver body image content.

3. Long form (10-20 minutes) content was considered more suitable and appropriate for body image and mental health topics in comparison to short reels (30 seconds). While there was recognition from participants that short, snappy videos are more likely to go viral, it is difficult for creators to make content that is impactful in 30 seconds.

The findings from this study strongly suggest that vlogs could be a popular, accessible, and effective way to deliver first-line mental health interventions focused on body image. Given that participants (adolescents and influencers) have provided ‘proof of concept’ of using creators to deliver vlogs on body image, the next step in this stream of research is to create the vlogs and test their effectiveness on improving young people’s body image and wellbeing.

We believe that this research programme has the potential to lead to improvements in body image and mental health in the future. Indeed, research shows that most adolescents with mental health concerns do not get help from health professionals. Reasons include staff shortages, geographical and financial constraints, and unique developmental barriers of fear, embarrassment, and wanting privacy from friends and family. The dominant approach to support outside of primary and secondary care has been interventions in schools and community settings. While evaluations show minimal to moderate benefits there are huge challenges involved in scaling-up. The NHS Long-term Plan and Five-Year Forward View of Mental Health stress the need for new digital tools to empower people to self-manage their health. Using social media to deliver interventions to whole populations and task-shifting delivery from health professionals to community providers are possible solutions.

By reaching whole populations of adolescents and embedding a free body image intervention into social media we could reduce existing barriers to accessing mental health support like stigma, out-of-pocket expense, and geography. We also more easily reach those in need; 80% of UK teens seek mental health support online and people with mental health problems spend more time on social media than those without. Furthermore, YouTube is the most popular viewing platform, especially among teens from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and minority ethnic groups.

Well-being and the digital worlds of unaccompanied refugee children and young people (URCYP)

Lead applicant: Dr Linda Morrice, University of Sussex

Co-applicants/partners:
Dr Linda Tip, University of Brighton
Naqeeb Saide, Young Leader, Hummingbird Project, Brighton
Mohammed Alzarei, Youth Ambassador at KRAN, Kent
Fawzia Worsley, Leader of KRAN Youth Forum and Youth Ambassador Programmes
Joshua Samuels, Service Manager, Hummingbird

Grant awarded: £25,557

Duration: 4 months

Project Summary
We aimed to examine the multiple ways in which Unaccompanied Refugee Children and Young People (URCYP) engage with digital resources. In doing so, we sought to identify the resources which offer support to URCYP, for example, online resources and social media which support education, language learning and the building of social connections and belonging. We also explored the risks that access to unfamiliar social media, online material and (transnational) social connections can present for the safety and well-being of URCYP.

Objectives of the project:

1. Explore how URCYP experience and engage with the digital world to support their social integration and sense of belonging in the UK, and how this interplays with their transnational lives and connections.

2. Identify what URCYP perceive to be the risks to their safety and well-being from digital engagement and how they navigate these risks.

3. Co-design and co-produce a pilot project with URCYP which will embed new knowledge aimed at promoting positive mental health among UCRP.

4. Establish a knowledge base and appropriate methodologies to apply to further research and dissemination.

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

The findings from surveys (with 11 care providers), workshops (with 28 URCYP), and key informant interviews (with 5 URCYP) revealed that URCYP use digital technology primarily to communicate with family and friends, to stay updated with news and information, and for distraction and amusement. WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube were identified as the most used social media channels. Some of the benefits of social media use included learning new skills, language, and cooking, as well as staying connected with friends and family, and supporting identity. However, excessive use of social media was linked to negative effects such as eye strain, headaches, and a negative impact on studies and well-being.

The study also identified potential risks, due to many of the young people not having used social media prior to arrival in the UK. URCYP have an increased vulnerability to exploitation, disassociation with the "real" world due to their excessive use of social media, the potential to fake or false friendship groups/news, and the possibility of becoming victims of money scams. URCYP are also susceptible to tracking and exploitation by agents or smugglers, with real trafficking concerns.

In summary, the study highlights the importance of understanding how URCYP use digital resources, the potential risks associated with their online engagement, and the positive outcomes and connectedness that social media and digital resources can provide when used in a balanced way. The findings suggest the need for tailored guidance and support to promote safe and responsible use of social media and digital resources among URCYP, which can be found in our project report.

Connecting Online Mental Health Services with Schools (COMS): What are the risks and opportunities?

Lead applicant: Dr Beth Bell, University of York

Co-applicants/partners:
Dan Fitton, University of Central Lancaster
Louisa Salhi, Kooth PLC
Dez Wilson, Kooth PLC

Grant awarded: £20,182

Duration: 10 months

Project summary
Adolescents experiencing psychological distress increasingly turn to digital technology for information and support. Reliance on digital services is changing how adolescents engage with other sources of information and support, including schools. For example, an adolescent in a mental health literacy class may later google symptoms of their own mental illness, rather than speak to school staff. Research has typically considered digital- and school-based mental health information and support independently (in the microsystem) meaning the interaction between the two (in the mesosystem) is overlooked. Yet this interaction is important; more synergistic working between digital- and school-based systems could lead to safer use and improved mental health outcomes.

The COMS project aimed to explore the interaction between digital- and school-based mental health services, including how this interaction may be harnessed to improve outcomes for adolescents. More specifically, the project adopted an exploratory qualitative approach to achieve three objectives:

1. Explore perceptions of how, when, and why digital and school-based mental health services interact, from a range of perspectives (including adolescents, education, and digital sector)

2. Identify the perceived risks and opportunities associated with the interaction between digital- and school-based mental health services.

3. Develop an agenda for future research, practice and policy.

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

Young people experiencing mental health difficulties value the ability to seek help from diverse sources, both online and at school. They recognised the strengths and weaknesses of different sources of information and support, and described using both online and school-based provision in combination with one another in complementary and overlapping ways. For example, while learning about influencers’ personal struggles with mental health on social media made young people feel less alone, they questioned the reliability of this information, and so still valued learning about mental health in school. They felt both school-based and online provision were needed, and neither one could replace the other.

Adult stakeholders similarly recognised the benefits for young people’s mental health of having both school-based and online support that worked together in complementary ways. They provided examples of how the two had worked well together, e.g., allowing online self-referrals for school-based services. They also identified areas where partnership working could be improved, e.g., improved education. However, lack of resources (especially funding) and variations in the quality of online mental health content were perceived as barriers to collaboration.

Despite the diversity of mental health support available to young people experiencing mental health difficulties, they still experienced problems when help-seeking, irrespective of setting. Most notably, interactive support from trusted adults was also not always available when needed. They also described how though information was readily available, finding credible and relevant information was a challenge.

Findings in Brief: two findings in brief for school staff were produced; one aimed at improving mental health education and one aimed at better understanding adolescent help-seeking in schools.

The ‘Third Space’ School Library: Fostering Digital Capability for Young People’s Mental Health

Lead applicant: Prof Julian McDougall, Bournemouth University

Co-applicants/partners:
Alison Tarrant, Chief Executive, School Libraries Association
Ali Kennedy, School Librarian, SLA member

Grant awarded: £9872

Duration: 6 months

Project summary
The ‘third space school library’ is a hybrid intervention in the digital world of 14-15 year old children with a focus on schools and peers. The project applies a theory of change for dynamic digital literacy to foster wellbeing, positive mental health and good consequences in the digital environment and builds on a collaboration between a research centre specialising in digital literacies (CEMP) and the School Library Association.

The research has generated transferable findings to support capacity-building for school librarians to work with school and external stakeholders to foster better mental health through digital literacy, situating the school library as a ‘third space’ between the school (the second space) and the everyday digital literacy practices of students (in the first space – home, family, community), in order to:

• Synthesise the intersection between school libraries and digital literacy;

• Identify transferable principles of enabling a ‘third space’ new practice model in school libraries for digital literacy;

• Provide evidence of the positive impact of digital literacy development in school libraries on the mental health, capabilities and resilience of students to improve their interactions with family, school and peers in and with regard to the digital environment.

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

• For a school library to be a third space and facilitate the conversion of digital literacy into capability for young people, the school librarian must be an advocate for digital literacy in combination with pastoral experience and the setting must be adequately resourced.

• The third space school library enabled young people to be reflective about their digital habits, but there was less evidence of them being reflexive with regard to behaviour changes for their digital wellbeing.

• Young people in the study demonstrated existing awareness of the nature of the digital ecosystem and the need for their peers to take a more critical and mindful approach to digital life, data and algorithms, for better mental health, but this was generally projected onto others, since they considered themselves to be generally resilient.

• Through the work produced in the third space school library, young people showed an advanced understanding of the need for changes in the digital lifeworld for their age group but felt that they had engaged with our project too late to make these changes in their own lives.  

• The young people in this specific setting met the learning outcomes from the activities designed to convert capabilities into consequences via digital media activism, but there was little if any evidence of either existing activism or new intentionality. 

Influencer Culture in the Digital Age: From Princesses to ‘Post’ Envy

Lead applicant: Dr Robyn Muir, University of Surrey

Co-applicant:
Dr Emily Setty, University of Surrey

Grant awarded: £16,416

Duration: 10 months

Project summary
This project focused on online ‘influencer culture’ affecting girls and young women. It aimed to understand how girls and young women navigate their media diets and content created by influential digital actors (or ‘influencers’) in relation to their experiences at home, school, and with peers. Digital media brings a ‘closeness’ and ‘realness’ based on perceptions of familiarity and intimacy, offering risks and opportunities for girls and young women pertaining to their self-concepts, self-esteem and body image (Cohen, Newton-John & Slater 2021). The issue is of heightened relevance following covid-19 due to increased digital mediation of personal, social, and public life.

The project objectives were to:

• Capture the perspectives of girls and young women aged 9-15, identifying intervention points through a new practice model and toolkit

• Disentangle the risks and opportunities for girls and young women

• Identify ways of empowering girls to harness opportunities and navigate risk online

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

The project has delivered a new practice model via an age stratified toolkit that has been co-created with the research team, girls, and youth practitioners. The toolkit provides age stratified insights on girls’ opinions and experiences of influencer culture, with practical recommendations for girls, parents, and educators to navigate the still emerging phenomena. The toolkit will be made available via the project website (details to follow).

Key findings

• The most effective interventions would start as early as possible, when girls are receptive to adult messaging and guidance and when the risks and harms of influencer culture have not become too embedded.

• With all age groups, interventions must be both youth-centred and critically informed. This means that the complexity and ambivalence around what constitutes influencer culture and the effects of influencer culture for differently situated girls must be recognised. Girls should be encouraged to offer their own meanings and adults must avoid overly pathologising the issue, with due recognition of the opportunities and benefits. Yet, fatalism and poor awareness among girls must be addressed via critically informed interventions.

• Critically informed interventions would push back against binary notions of risk, harm, opportunity, and benefit and would address a continuum of outcomes of influencer culture for girls and would connect the risks and harms to the wider social contexts in which they are given meaning.

• Overly individualistic approaches that focus on individual resilience and digital literacy should be avoided in favour of addressing the intersections between digital affordances and girls’ agency. The approach should also involve recognising the constraints on agency and the ambivalence that can arise due to distinctions between cognitive awareness and skills and socio-emotional challenges.

Identifying Protective and Risk Behaviour Patterns of Online Communication in Young People

Lead applicant: Dr Emily Lowthian, University of Swansea

Co-applicant: Dr Rebecca Anthony, Cardiff University

Grant awarded: £13901

Duration: 6 months

Project summary
Social-media use can be associated with mood symptoms, risk-taking, and cyberbullying (Ivie et al., 2020; Richards et al., 2015; Vannucci et al., 2017). However, research has focused on time spent online rather than contextual aspects of online behaviours, such as how adolescents engage with social media and whom they engage with (Bekalu et al., 2019; Smith et al., 2021) – factors which may also combine to affect wellbeing. The project aimed to develop a new wellbeing resource to support positive social-media engagement by young people, based on new knowledge about how particular patterns in the contextual characteristics of their social-media behaviour may either positively or negatively affect mental, physical and social wellbeing.

Objectives:

1. Identify any patterns evident in young people’s online communication behaviour, examining a number of contextual characteristics, and test whether such patterns differ according to individual s’ characteristics (e.g., gender, socioeconomic status).

2. Compare wellbeing levels associated with different communication patterns to identify which, if any, either positively or negatively support wellbeing.

3. Co-produce with young people a concept for a clear and user-acceptable information resource outlining how to adopt social-media behaviours that promote wellbeing, with potential to be developed into a resource for use by government and third-sector stakeholders.

KEY FINDINGS & OUTPUTS FROM THE RESEARCH

We used data on over 1,400 young people aged 9 – 16 years to understand how their social media and online communication behaviours grouped together were related to emotional mood, sleep, and feelings of being supported by family or friends and loneliness. 

Our research found four groups of common behaviours on social media and online:

1. Avid users – Young people who regularly posted content (pictures, videos etc.), spend considerable time talking to friends, family and people they only knew online.

2.  Midways – Young people who did not post content regularly but spoke to friends often online. This group did not speak to their family often, and half said they wanted to spend the same or less time online; most did not speak to people online they did not know in-person.

3. Scholars – Young people who completed schoolwork online often, along with engaging in political discussions or reading the news online. Many spoke to friends and family regularly but spent less time speaking to people they did not know in-person.

4. Passengers – Young people who did not post often, engage in political discussions, or talk to friends, family or people they did not know in-person. Generally, their activity was low online.

The Avid users had the highest scores for mood problems, and often had problems with sleeping. They also were less likely to feel supported by their family and had low ratings of their appearance. The Midways also had lower social wellbeing, reporting fewer friends and low appearance.

Comic Book

Blog

Young people posting daily social media content and in regular contact with internet-only friends could be at risk for poorer wellbeing WISERD (April 2023)

Enabling Creativity Through Inclusive Co-Design in Game Making to Promote Positive Mental Health Outcomes

Lead applicant: Dr Thomas Hughes-Roberts, University of Derby

Co-applicants/partners:
Prof Angela Bartram, University of Derby
Prof Deborah Robinson, University of Derby
Mike Pride, Kingsmead School and Newton’s Walk Schools
Alistair Crawford, St Martin’s & St Andrew's Schools
Ruchita Shaikh, Artcore

Grant awarded: £21,913

Duration: 10 months

Project summary
Digital games, and in particular, online games play an increasingly important role in facilitating and shaping social interactions amongst young people. However, there is also evidence of several issues within gaming and their societies. For example, cyberbullying, harassment, and related toxic behaviour that can lead to inequality and exclusion. What could be a platform for breaking down barriers is often exclusionary with aspects of game culture have been identified as excluding females and ethnic minorities due in part to gender and racial stereotyping, types of activity engagement, on-screen role models. There is, therefore, a need for positive inclusive game design and proposals for what the process for these and the design creation tasks would look like. Creativity in game design itself can lead to development of personal meaningfulness through exploration of personal experience which can positively impact mental health outcomes.

Aims include:

1. Identify how online games influence the mental health of young players (10-16) and determine the effect this has on relationships with their peers.

2. Explore how engagement with the creative process of designing games can produce positive mental health outcomes that are measurable and inform society.

3. Determine the impact on inclusivity where co-design approaches are utilised.

KEY FINDINGS

The project conducted an in-depth literature survey, focus groups with key stakeholders, workshops to develop the co-create game design toolkit, a piloting session and workshop to run the toolkit with neurodivergent youth and a full trial in a local secondary school consisting of each Year 8 class.

From these sessions the following define the key messaging from the project work:

1. Literature highlights a growing importance placed on the role of gaming for young people. While there are noted risks associated with game play (e.g., addiction, exposure to toxic behaviour), as with most forms of entertainment, when taken in moderation gaming can be seen in a positive light. For marginalised groups, it provides an outlet for self-expression, a platform for mixing with like-minded peers and an overall positive for mental health.

2. Stakeholders validated literature, games play an important role in not only offering a personal escape in the form of entertainment but also as a means of accessing a community and, for some, allowing self-expression in creative games. It is noted that the role games play differs between defined stakeholder groups, and this warrants further investigation.

3. Game design can be broken down into a number of tasks which are easily accessible and available at a low cost (paper prototyping), providing a pathway to creativity.

4. When utilised in the classroom, game design increased levels of collaboration and engagement according to observation. Survey results suggest 91% of participants felt creative and 78% reported an intention to continue to engage with game creation. Participants also reported pride in their final outputs/game designs suggesting a positive impact on elements of mental health and wellbeing.