Transforming School Environments to Prevent Adolescent Depression: Expanding Perception Boxes with CATCH-IT Community

Overview:

CATCH-IT is an evidence-based intervention designed to prevent depression by helping teens build resilience and develop healthy coping skills.This study aims to test the benefits of delivering CATCH-IT within schools, using a community-based approach to support at-risk students by expanding mental health literacy and emotional support across entire classrooms.

Abstract: 

The technology-based CATCH-IT intervention has been found to alter the way in which symptomatic adolescents engage with their environments and process information, thereby expanding their Perception Boxes, and reducing their risk for depression. CATCH-IT use has also been associated with fewer episodes of depression over time, fewer symptoms of anxiety, less hopelessness, less social isolation and social rejection, and, for, adolescents who complete the full intervention, reductions in suicidal ideation. In this comparative effectiveness trial, we aim to examine whether adolescents with elevated symptoms of depression who engage with the CATCH-IT intervention at the community level (i.e., with classmates and educators) will reveal a greater number of depression-free days over time, relative to symptomatic adolescents who engage with CATCH-IT at the individual level. We will also examine changes in a range of mediating variables, including cognitive styles, social skills, stigma, and implicit biases. Cluster randomization will be used to assign adolescents to the CATCH-IT only or CATCH-IT community conditions, and assessments will be conducted at three time points over a 6-month follow-up interval. If we find that community participation enhances the benefits of the CATCH-IT intervention, we will be able to disseminate this program as part of our existing school-based universal mental health screening program, currently being offered annually to thousands of adolescents, in order to address the problem of adolescent depression at the community level. Ultimately, this low-cost, scalable technology-based intervention has the potential to be disseminated broadly, expanding the Perception Boxes of adolescents, and those in their environments, to more effectively address the alarming problem of adolescent depression.

Broader Impact:

As a low-cost, school-based program, it can expand access to mental health support, particularly for underserved youth, and be integrated into existing universal screening efforts.