Improving Mental Health Help-Seeking Behaviours for Male Students: A Framework for Developing a Complex Intervention

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Public Health
• Intervention Science

Background:

• Men exhibit lower mental health help-seeking rates than women, contributing to higher suicide rates.
• University students, particularly males, represent a vulnerable population with reluctance to access psychological support.
• Existing mental health solutions for students often lack specific design for male help-seeking barriers.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present a comprehensive framework for designing mental health interventions tailored to male university students.
• To enhance male students' willingness to seek psychological support.
• To address the disparity in mental health help-seeking between male and female students.

Main Methods:

• Utilized the Medical Research Council's (MRC) framework for developing complex interventions.
• Reviewed previous help-seeking interventions and their evaluation methodologies.
• Developed a theoretical framework identifying barriers male students face in accessing support.
• Mapped these factors onto a behavior change model to inform intervention design.

Main Results:

• Identified key factors influencing male students' help-seeking behavior for mental health.
• Proposed a structured approach to intervention development grounded in behavioral science.
• Provided an example intervention with specific functions and behavior change techniques.

Conclusions:

• The proposed framework offers a systematic method for creating evidence-based mental health interventions for male students.
• Implementation of this framework can potentially improve male students' access to psychological support.
• This approach aims to reduce the gap in mental health help-seeking between genders in university populations.