Social capital as a theory of change to improve young people’s mental health

Nature of the research: The ability to participate in and make use of a range of social networks influences people’s potential to achieve health and life goals (1). Young people who have opportunities to access such networks to build social capital are more likely to do well (2). The literature on social capital and health has grown over the last few decades, but in relation to young people’s health some inadequacies remain that prohibit its theoretical basis to be translated into a set of actions (3).
Whilst most OECD countries have seen overall improvement in prosperity, no equivalent progress in the mental health outcomes of their youth is seen. Health policy needs to be based on both socio-economical determinants of young people’s health and the social context of young people’s lives when thinking about the best ways of promoting their mental health. The failure to do so will continue to result in increasing inequalities. It is also known that interventions that are based on theory of more likely to have an impact (4). Advancing knowledge of social capital as a theory of change is an obvious next step.
Aim of the research and impacts:
Advance current knowledge by taking a mixed method approach to: develop a generic theory of change framework; synthesize existing knowledge on social capital to understand how it can be applied to young people’s mental health; generate a social capital specific (theory) of change underpinned by the principle of youth participation; test the hypothesized theoretical pathways in empirical intervention studies.