Success4life Youth Empowerment for Promoting Well-being and Boosting Mental Health: Protocol for an Experimental Study

Abstract

Background: There is an increasingly alarming worsening of mental health among the youth. There remain significant unmet needs for developing innovative, evidence-based technology-enhanced, positive psychology interventions (PPIs) all-inclusive in targeting psychological distress and risk factors related to high-risk behavior commonly encountered in adolescents. Objective: We aim to assess the effectiveness of a hybrid (incorporating both synchronous and asynchronous learning) and holistic (targeting social and emotional learning and tackling risk factors unique for this age group) PPI, "success4life youth empowerment," in improving well-being in the youth. Methods: Students' well-being will be assessed by the 5-item World Health Organization Well-Being Index, and hope will be assessed by the 6-item Children's Hope Scale at week 0, week 8, and week 10, month 6, and month 12. Any improvement in well-being and hope will be measured, estimating the difference in postintervention (week 8 and week 10) and preintervention (week 0) scores by determining the P value and effect size using appropriate statistical tests. Results: This study includes 2 phases: pilot phase 1, delivered by the creators of the succcess4life youth empowerment modules and platform, and phase 2, which will consist of the estimation of scalability through the recruitment of trainers. We hope to start student recruitment by 2022 and aim to complete the results for phase 1 pilot testing by 2023. Conclusions: We anticipate that a primarily web-based, 10-week holistic PPI can support improvement in the mental wellness of the youth and has the potential for effective scalability.