An evaluation of the teen and Youth Mental Health First Aid training with a CALD focus: an uncontrolled pilot study with adolescents and adults in Australia

Australia is an ethnically diverse nation with one of the largest refugee resettlement programs worldwide. Evidence suggests that although the risk of developing mental disorders in culturally linguistically diverse (CALD) adolescents may be elevated, professional help-seeking in CALD youth is low. This study sought to evaluate the face-to-face teen (tMHFA) and Youth Mental Health First Aid (YMHFA) training with a CALD focus, which aimed at improving mental health literacy (MHL) and skills in youth and adults assisting adolescents with mental health problems. An uncontrolled pre-, post-, and follow-up design was used to measure improvement in MHL measures in year 10 students and adults. A total of 372 year 10 students from 2 high schools were trained. 308 responded to the pre-training questionnaire, 220 responded to the post-training questionnaire, and 256 completed the 3-month follow-up questionnaire. A total of 34 adults were trained, 32 responded to the pre-questionnaire and 31 responded to the post-training questionnaire and 20 completed the 3-month follow-up questionnaire. Following training, students were more likely to endorse 'helpful' adults as valid sources of help (p