Promoting positive mental health amongst young people
Young people who are resilient, confident, optimistic and have good self-esteem are better equipped to deal with life’s challenges with an increased ability to resist stress, cope with difficulties and change and recover faster and more completely from traumatic life events.
In collaboration with Penumbra and a group of young people the National Programme has created a profile page on Bebo where young people can chat and share information.
The aim of the forum is to raise awareness of positive mental health and wellbeing, and help to create a young people’s ‘mental health movement’. It is targeted at young people aged between 13-18 years old.
Online Social Networks
More and more young people use social networking sites such as MySpace and Bebo, helping them to form relationships and gain confidence in communicating their opinions and feelings. The access offered by many of these sites means that young people can create online profiles and make connections with other young people.
Using this medium to promote positive mental wellbeing offers a level of credibility with young people. As such, there is no direct association to the National Programme. It is seen by users as an independent profile page.
Positive Pete
The focus of this forum is a cartoon character called Positive Pete. Pete is a young person who represents our target audience and their life challenges. Using the profile page features - profile information, diary entries, drawings, poll and quiz and creating some short animated films - simple and subtle messages on how young people can maintain their mental wellbeing can be communicated.
The profile page aims to encourage young people to absorb, talk and share information with their network of friends helping to promote positive mental health and wellbeing.
Here is the latest film as it appears on the profile page:
Most of the content has been created by young people with support from the National Programme Team. The profile page is public which means it can be viewed by anyone.
The forum can be viewed at
