Nothing about us without us: civic activism as a mental health intervention

包括我们所做的一些研究在内的研究表明，其他改善年轻人心理健康的方法可能与目前的心理健康服务一样好，如果不是更好的话。这个项目将探索另一种方式。参与“公民行动”是否有利于面临诸多不利条件的年轻人（简称YP） ？“公民行动主义”意味着共同开展社区项目，不仅改善我们个人的生活；还有其他的YP。它涉及到发展大学研究人员所说的“公民身份”。这包括感觉我们属于一个社区，无论是面对面的、在线的还是两者兼而有之——学者们称之为“全球本地”社区。我们的直觉是，通过公民行动创造归属感可以帮助我们拥有积极的身份认同。我们认为青春期，一个用来描述11-25岁年龄组的词，是这种支持的理想时期，因为我们正在发展身份，因为我们离开了童年。研究告诉我们，一个强大而积极的身份会给我们的生活指明方向，并表明我们在世界上很重要。所有这些都有利于我们现在和未来的心理健康。我们知道公民行动主义需要研究，因为在布莱克浦，我们已经成功地试验了一种支持青少年心理健康的新方法。这是基于一种“战胜困难，改变困难”的韧性方法，我们称之为Boingboing resilience。我们的方法有助于我们建立自身的弹性，同时挑战那些首先会增加风险的劣势。这个项目将帮助我们在这项工作的基础上继续发展，并与康沃尔和纽汉的其他青少年青少年和他们的成年支持者分享。这些是其他面临巨大挑战的领域。我们还想从纽汉和康沃尔的青年党的工作中学习，包括在气候变化行动主义方面的工作。我们新的、平等的合作研究伙伴关系来自不同的年龄、职业和背景；YP面临着许多不利因素，成人社区研究人员、学术人员和心理健康专业人员。我们要做什么？我们的新研究将调查布莱克浦、纽汉和康沃尔的300个YP。这将测试关于YP身份、公民活动和心理健康的现有调查问题。我们会让青少年参与学习困难的问题，因为他们经常被忽视。2. 我们将做一个“文献综述”。这意味着要探索世界各地的学者已经发表的关于如何克服困难建立YP积极身份的文章。这包括复原力、心理健康和旨在改善心理健康的公民行动主义。3. 我们将组织并举办一个大型会议（“网络峰会”），邀请许多对我们的工作感兴趣和有影响力的人。年轻的共同研究人员将与成年人一起介绍文献综述的发现，我们将激励人们一起做一个新的大投标。4. Blackpool, Brighton， Newham和Cornwall团队成员将使用YP共同设计和领导的YP友好技术计划和运行3个活动，包括有学习困难的YP。我们称之为“社会学习空间”（简称sls）。他们会发现：a) YP与他们社区的历史联系；b) YP积极参与他们现在的社区，参与做出积极的改变；c) YP通过公民活动积极地为他们社区的未来做出贡献。如果大家同意，我们会记录下sls里发生的一切。这将被写为“发现”。这些发现将帮助我们规划一个公民活动家的方法（称为干预框架）。我们将在学术出版物上分享工作成果，但也将以更多人能够理解的方式分享工作成果，包括在互联网上。随着更多的人加入进来，我们将一起写一份大的投标书，这样我们就可以测试我们的公民行动主义干预框架。

Research, including some that we have done, says other ways of improving young people's mental health might be just as good, if not better, than current mental health services. This project would explore another way. Does getting involved in 'civic activism' benefit young people (YP for short) who face many disadvantages? 'Civic activism' means doing community projects together that make not just our own individual lives better; but other YP's too. It involves developing what university researchers call our 'civic identity'. This involves feeling we belong to a community whether face to face, online or both -'glocal' communities is what academics call them. Our hunch is that creating belonging through civic activism could help us have positive identities. We think adolescence, a word used to describe the age group between 11-25 years old, is the ideal time for this support because we are developing identity as we move out of childhood. Research tells us that a strong and positive identity offers us direction in life and indicates that we matter in the world. All this is good for our current and future mental health. We know civic activism needs researching because in Blackpool we have already had success experimenting with a new way of supporting YP's mental health. This is based on an approach to resilience that is about 'Beating the Odds and Changing the Odds' which we call Boingboing Resilience. Our approach helps us build our own resilience as well as challenge the disadvantages that increase risks in the first place. This project would help us build on that work and share it with other YP and their adult supporters in Cornwall and Newham. These are other areas facing big challenges. We also want to learn from Newham and Cornwall's YP's work, including on climate change activism. Our new and equal partnership of co-researchers come from different generations, professions and backgrounds; YP facing many disadvantages, adult community researchers, academics and mental health professionals. What we will do1. Our new research will survey 300 YP in Blackpool, Newham and Cornwall. This will test survey questions already available about YP's identity, civic activism and mental health. We will involve YP with learning difficulties because they often get left out. 2. We will do a 'literature review'. This means exploring what academics worldwide have already published on building YP's positive identities against the odds. This includes resilience, mental health and civic activism aimed at improving mental health. 3. We will organise and run a big meeting (a 'networking summit') and invite lots of people interested in our work and who have influence. Young co-researchers will present the literature review findings with adults and we will motivate people to do a new big bid together. 4. Blackpool, Brighton, Newham and Cornwall team members will plan and run 3 events using YP-friendly technologies, co-designed and co-led by YP, including YP with learning difficulties. We call these 'social learning spaces' (SLSs for short). They will find out about: a) YP connecting with their communities' historyb) YP getting actively involved with their present communities, to get involved in making positive changes c) YP actively contributing to their communities' future through civic activism.5. With everyone's permission, we will record what happens in the SLSs. This will be written up as 'findings'. The findings will help us plan a civic activist approach (called an intervention framework). We will share work in academic publications but also in ways that more people can understand it, including on the internet. With more people joining in, together we will write a big bid so we can test our civic activism intervention framework.