The following projects of the Pathways Research and Training Center completed between 2009 and 2014.
Career Visions: Enhancing Career Development Engagement and Self-Determination for Young Adults with Serious Mental Health Conditions
Project Summary
The Career Visions Project focused on the career planning and development of young adults between the ages of 20 and 25 years who experience serious mental health issues. The Self-Determination Career Development Model was adapted to address the unique issues of these young adults. Young adult advisors and others informed and guided the model adaptations. Young adults who received the intervention learned and applied skills in order to define their own career goal, identify steps to achieve this goal, and take action to complete these steps.
Project Outcomes
Sixty-seven young adults, 20 to 30 years of age, with mental health diagnoses were randomly assigned to intervention and control groups. Statistically significant greater increases were made by the intervention group, versus the control group, for self-determination and career planning engagement, and self-determination at least partially mediated increases in career planning engagement. With career planning self-determination interventions, young adults with mental health challenges might be able to achieve better career and life outcomes than is typical for this population.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Enhancing the Career Planning Self-Determination of Young Adults with Mental Health Challenges
Better Futures: Increasing Postsecondary Preparation and Engagement of Youth with Serious Mental Health Conditions in Foster Care
Project Summary
The Better Futures project addressed the barriers to participating in higher education faced by youth in foster care with mental health issues. The project developed and experimentally validated effective ways to help these young people prepare, plan and enroll in college or vocational training, and it drew upon best practices in supported education in mental health and strategies for promoting self-determination. Youth participating in the intervention received individualized coaching, peer support, and connection to foster care alumni and community resources. Researchers investigated the impact of participating in Better Futures on youths' empowerment, confidence, planning for postsecondary education, social support, mental health recovery, and academic performance.
Project Outcomes
The study findings indicate that most young people in foster care, including those with mental health conditions, want to pursue higher education and can successfully prepare for and participate in college or vocational school.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Achieve My Plan (AMP): A Randomized Field-Test of Youth Engagement in Mental Health Treatment Planning
Project Summary
For young people aged 11.5-18 with serious mental health conditions, a comprehensive, team-based approach is increasingly seen as the preferred mechanism for creating and monitoring treatment plans. Unfortunately, the young people themselves rarely participate meaningfully in these kinds of interdisciplinary planning teams. As a result, they can become disengaged from the planning process and unmotivated to participate in the planned treatment. The Achieve My Plan! (AMP) study tested a promising intervention developed by researchers at Portland State University, in collaboration with young people who have mental health conditions, service providers and caregivers.
Project Outcomes
The study systematically evaluated the impact of the AMP intervention on youth participation and engagement in treatment planning, youth empowerment, and youth mental health and recovery outcomes.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Ongoing Activities
The AMP enhancement is being implemented in states and agencies around the nation. For more information visit https://achievemyplan.pdx.edu, or contact Janet Walker at janetw@pdx.edu.
Transition Policy Consortium
Project Summary
The Transition Policy Consortium included several strands of work focused on identifying effective strategies for increasing system capacity to meet the needs of young people with serious mental health conditions as they transition into adulthood. Particular emphasis was placed on understanding how state and federal policies encourage or inhibit this sort of system development.
Project Outcomes
One strand of research focused on the implementation of the Community Support for Transition Inventory (CSTI). This inventory was developed to assess services infrastructure available at both community and state levels to support transition aged youth and young adults. The project also undertook an analysis of key provisions of the Affordable Health Care Act from the perspective of the needs and preferences of young adults. This resulted in a series of brief papers explicating some of the key components of health care reform.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Finding Our Way: Improving Transition Supports for Native American/Alaskan Native Youth
Project Summary
Finding Our Way furthered the development of a culturally specific self-assessment tool for American Indian/Alaskan Native young people. Developed for youth ages 13-19, the tool was modified to include issues relevant to transition. Project products included training, supervision and coaching materials to improve provider practice.
Article/Key Publication(s)
eHealth Literacy: eHealth Literacy in Transition-Aged Youth and Young Adults with Serious Mental Health Conditions
Project Summary
This study investigated how young adults with mental health conditions use the internet to access information about their diagnosis, medications, and treatment options. It also developed and piloted a training designed to improve the eHealth literacy of transition-aged youth with serious mental health conditions.
Project Outcomes
Based on the focus groups conducted, YAMHC use the internet to find information related to their mental health and use the information to help with their care. However, at times the young adults felt overhelmed by, and distrustful of the information available.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Online Mental Health Information Seeking in Young Adults with Mental Health Challenges
Recovery Outcomes: Predictors of Positive Recovery Outcomes for Transition Aged Youth
Project Summary
The project's aim was to examine the relationship between school attendance, school performance, educational supports, youth empowerment in mental health treatment, school functioning and career strengths, and the outcomes of educational engagement and employment. The researchers explored factors predicting positive education outcomes for older youth and young adults through a secondary analysis of data from the National Evaluation of the Comprehensive Community Mental Health Services for Children and their Families Program.
Project Outcomes
The researchers' analysis found a connection between programs and practices based on positive youth development approaches and improved educational outcomes for emerging adults.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Predicting Positive Education Outcomes for Emerging Adults in Mental Health Systems of Care
Stigmatization: Mediators of Stigmatization toward Youth with Severe Depression and ADHD
Project Summary
The growing knowledge base about the nature of stigmatizing attitudes and beliefs toward adults with mental illnesses has contributed to the development of new strategies for reducing stigmatization. The relative lack of knowledge about stigmatization toward youth has hindered parallel efforts for young people. This study used a large national data set to test a series of hypotheses regarding potential mediators of the stigmatization encountered by youth who experience severe depression or ADHD.
Project Outcomes
For both depression and ADHD, findings suggested that strategies for reducing stigmatization should address young people's fear that their peers with emotional or behavioral difficulties are dangerous.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Youths' Help-Seeking Intentions for ADHD and Depression: Findings from a National Survey
Young People's Stigmatization of Peers With Depression and ADHD
The Pathways Transition Training Collaborative (PTTC)
Project Summary
The Pathways Transition Training Collaborative (PTTC) was established to enhance the skills of service providers working with young people with serious mental health conditions and to provide information and tools for young people and their family members, service providers, researchers, and policy makers involved in developing and implementing effective transition-focused interventions, policies, and research. A nationwide advisory group, PTTC was made up of young adults, family members, and interdisciplinary representatives of universities, organizations, and agencies serving young people with serious mental health conditions and their families. PTTC members met through quarterly conference calls, individual meetings, and small workgroups to provide input and refine training products and tools.
Project Outcomes
The PTTC drafted and disseminated a set of core competencies for service providers working with youth and young adults with serious mental health conditions and developed and tested a Transition Service Provider Competency Scale (TSPCS).
The core competencies were the basis for the development of an interdisciplinary graduate level course titled "Improving Youth Transitions," co-taught by a faculty instructor, a young adult, and a parent, and positively evaluated by students. Course content was used to create a series of free one-hour online training modules focused on Promoting Positive Pathways to Adulthood designed to develop skills needed by service providers working with young people with mental health difficulties.
Article/Key Publication(s)
Transition Service Provider Competency Scale (TSPCS)