Undertaking the co-design of climate distress services for young people in British Columbia

This proposal aims to facilitate a new partnership between the Green Technology Education Centre (GTEC), the Mental Health and Climate Change Alliance (MHCCA/SFU), and youth and young adults, aged 16-24. Leveraging this partnership, we will convene and collaborate with youth to inform the development of potential GTEC campus- and digitally-based interventions for climate-related distress. The convening and collaboration activities will include two multi-stage focus groups and ongoing meetings between GTEC and MHCCA researchers. Each focus group cohort will consist of 6-12 young people, recruited through the MHCCA and GTEC professional networks and advertisements on Twitter and Facebook. Each focus group will be interviewed twice to: 1) Explore current reactions to climate change and 2) Develop ideas about educational and support services that GTEC can offer to support young people. These focus group interviews and ongoing meetings between GTEC and MHCCA team members will be leveraged to develop a CIHR project grant proposal that will aim to develop, pilot, and evaluate an intervention for climate change related distress among young people, aged 16-24.

Team members: Arden Henley (Green Technology Education Centre); Linda Thyer (Green Technology Education Centre); Andreea Bratu (UBC – School of Population and Public Health).