Improving youth wellbeing for a mentally healthy Australia, now and in the future
Globally, the leading causes of burden and disease in young people are substance use and mental illness, with one in seven 10-19 year-olds experiencing a mental disorder.
While a global crisis, frequent lockdowns and disruptions to education systems and social interactions, job losses and housing affordability were just some of the drivers for higher rates of mental illness in Australia, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The psychological toll of these effects is still being felt today.
Australia’s youth population needs innovative and effective solutions to address this crisis. At the University of Sydney’s Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, young people have been the focus across several projects, such as Australia’s Mental Health Think Tank. While the Mental Health Think Tank initially focused on the mental health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, it now aims to provide a national response to mental health by empowering Australians and creating a better mental health system, embracing hope and building on strengths. The BHP Foundation has been supporting this project since 2020.
Since then, the shared partnership has laid the foundations for The Mentally Healthy Futures Project, which works to break down silos to improve youth mental health.
The Mentally Healthy Futures Project
The Mentally Healthy Futures Project, established in 2023, is a five-year project aiming to establish domestic and international partnerships and provide holistic, evidence-based policy recommendations to improve Australian’s mental health.
To date, the Mentally Healthy Futures project has coordinated impactful submissions from Australia’s Mental Health Think Tank, The Matilda Centre and the PREMISE Centre of Research Excellence in Prevention and Early Intervention in Mental Illness and Substance Use Youth Advisory Board regarding the Measuring What Matters Framework. Measuring What Matters is Australia's first national framework which tracks progress towards holistic wellbeing which will inform future economic modelling and policy direction.
Increasingly, governments, private and not-for-profit sector organizations are looking for perspectives from young people to strengthen their strategies and decision-making. However, they rarely have an understanding of how to do it in ways that empower young people, and ensure they do no harm.
In a global first, the project has conducted leading research to comprehensively review the mental health and wellbeing impacts on young people while participating in engagement initiatives. The published report outlines guidelines to safeguard youth wellbeing during engagement with advisory groups, representative councils, advocacy and activism regarding issues that affect their lives.
Running until 2027, The Mentally Healthy Futures Project will democratize evidence by drawing together global and local knowledge from diverse sources – including academic literature, original research, policy case studies, and lived experience accounts. This research will inform guidelines and principles for a mentally healthy Australia, now and in the future.
More about the Matilda Centre
The Matilda Centre brings together world-leading researchers, clinicians, people with lived experience and community to share skills, synergize data, harness new technologies and trial innovative programs to prevent and treat mental and substance use disorders.
Their research aims to support attitude and policy change among government, private sector and non-government organizations.
Learn more about the Mentally Healthy Futures Project
Read the Submission to the Australian Government Treasury on Measuring What Matters:
https://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/handle/2123/31556
Read the Youth Participation Scoping Review: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0293006