What is in It for Them? Understanding the Impact of a ‘Support, Appreciate, Listen Team’ (SALT)-Based Suicide Prevention Peer Education Program on Peer Educators

Abstract

Youth suicide is a public health problem in India, and young people in school, particularly adolescents, experience heavy psychological burden. Prevention programs, involving peer educators (PEs), have proved useful strategies to address this problem, but their impact on the PEs is less understood, particularly in India. This qualitative study aims to explore the changes observed in PE students who were involved in a ‘mindfulness’ and ‘Support-Appreciate-Listen–Team’ (SALT)-based peer education program to address suicidal behavior in Indian school students. One hundred and fourteen students were trained as PEs in six high schools in Pune to identify and respond to the needs of students in distress. By listening to the narratives of the PEs, their parents, school authorities, and the associated NGO team, we reflect on perceived social, emotional, behavioral, and cognitive changes in PEs. The PEs demonstrated enhanced caring for those in distress both inside and outside school by improved listening skills, self-awareness, care, and empathy. Furthermore, the program had a positive impact on their broad emotional intelligence and PEs expressed increased ownership of life, taking action, and seeking support where needed. The study concludes that mindfulness and SALT-based peer education (PE) programs are valuable for the PEs. This could be used to motivate PEs to volunteer in such programs. Other results are discussed and further research areas are suggested.

Diffusing Innovation and Motivating Change: Adopting a Student‐Led and Whole‐School Approach to Mental Health Promotion

“…Research has shown that students in distress regard their peers as their first line of contact in help‐seeking, 12 and that positive peer relationships function as a protective factor against stress 13 . Noting the importance of peers in protecting students' mental health, schools have begun to adopt the student‐led approach in programs, which have effectively heightened students' readiness to support their peers, 14 increased students' sense of connection and belonging to their school, 15 and improved peer leaders' emotional intelligence, 16 all of which reaffirm the value of empowering students to promote their peers' mental health.…”

“…Secondly, students' lack of interest and perceived stigma toward mental health highlighted a need to promote and destigmatize mental health in ways that are more appealing to students. Other difficulties included difficulty in making time for wellbeing‐promoting activities 16 . In short, both personal and organizational factors have challenged the success of introducing peer‐led mental health promotion into schools.…”

Capacity Strengthening Among Youth to Improve Health Outcome: A Review of Literature

“…Health care professional must understand about the reason of youth needs and willingness to engage in capacity strengthening (Mukherjee, 2015). Youth participation is not only limited to their social support such as being peer educator for depression and bullying problem (Yin et al, 2017;Zachariah et al, 2018), but youth must participate to take care or maintain their family health behaviour too. When health care professional could not see this opportunity and youth capacity, youth can act passive or felt being excluded.…”

Critical Overview of Adolescent Suicides in India; A Public Health Concern

“…The results indicate that that the mindfulness and Support, Appreciate, Listen, Team (SALT) using Peer Educators (PE) have enhanced the PEs broad emotional intelligence and PEs expressed increased ownership of life, taking actionand seeking support when needed. Research studies also suggest that future research should be carried out in developing nations to understand the knowledge regarding suicides especially in the adolescent age group (5) . WHO further emphasizes that India develop a comprehensive suicide prevention plan and integrate it with the mental health act to contain the growing threat of adolescent suicides.…”