Most mental health problems start in childhood or adolescence and their incidence in children and young people is increasing. We also know that mental health issues are experienced differently and can be even more challenging when someone is facing discrimination based on identity or where and how you live, as well tough financial circumstances.

We are seeking to create an understanding in collaboration with young people, families and communities to develop better research processes and methods.

We have been focusing on developing methods to listen to marginalised young people. Marginalised can mean young people who are socially, economically and educationally excluded in society – this could be because of discrimination or poverty, but being left out or overlooked can be in other ways too.

We’ve been looking into the different approaches that other researchers have used to involve marginalised young people, so that we can learn from these experiences too. This has involved looking at the existing literature or research that has been carried out in this area as well as examining different processes of involvement, like ‘co-production.’