mental health of young people digitally strengthened

Inspiration

Many students* in Germany suffer from mental problems, such as self-doubt or pressure to perform. According to the German Medical Journal, 10-20% even have a mental disorder. Neither the care for one's own mental health, nor the handling of mental illness is included in the framework curriculum. In addition, the support of committed teachers* is made more difficult by the current school closures.

Goal

We are a young team of psychology students of the Humboldt University of Berlin and would like to support students by imparting knowledge and methods for self-care. At the same time we would like to offer teachers a possibility to encourage their students to deal with mental challenges.

Project

Together with you, we would like to provide teachers and students with a tool that enables them to take their mental health into their own hands and receive support from teachers. The student version of the interactive app is complementary to the teacher version.

The app provides both target groups with content (short videos, texts, memes) to convey basic knowledge about the human psyche and mental health as well as tips and methods for self-care (in general and with regard to the current crisis situation).

In addition to the content, a chatbot is to be integrated as a diagnostic tool for the students. In addition to providing direct answers to central questions on mental health and self-care, this also serves to record the mood with the aim of referring to helpful content and exercises.

The exercises, which are as playful as possible, enable students to directly apply the knowledge they have acquired and learn skills such as reflecting on their own needs or activating mental and social resources. Instead of the exercises, teachers receive teaching materials on the subject of mental health for digital and analogue implementation.

To enable teachers and students to exchange information discreetly and directly, the integration of a messenger system would be ideal.

In addition, teachers should be able to use the app to send surveys to the students to get an impression of the group mood (aggregated evaluation of the data).