Communicating Mental Wellbeing; a design and science collaboration to help reduce the stigma of one of societies critical health challenges

Communicating Mental Wellbeing Exhibition; An international collaborative investigation between design and psychiatry to examine how the stigma of Mental Health can be reduced.

The project instigated by Bryan Clark at Falmouth and psychiatrists from Cornwall NHS Foundation Trust, saw an initial branding project develop into a global service design challenge. This challenge centred on bringing shared insights from doctors, designers, carers and patients together; using storytelling through film and UX design to deconstruct and challenge the language and insights that so stigmatises those facing and living with mental health issues.

The exhibition brought together various integrated design solutions, campaigns and digital outputs that the project teams in Falmouth and China completed. These outcomes covered an array of contextual start points, from care in schools, mood monitoring Apps, language and ‘label’ analysis tools and social media platforms, to name but a few – all aiming to democratise access to mental health support.

The research and design outcomes were exhibited simultaneously in the UK and in China at Anhui University across September and October 2016. A Chinese delegation also visited Falmouth at this time, engaging with design workshops and further meetings regarding the future development of the project.

Part of the project’s investigation initially unearthed the scale of the invisible epidemic facing the world, with mental healthcare spend and problems growing exponentially over the coming years. By 2020 the NHS will face the reality of the problem being one of its biggest healthcare priorities of modern times. Therefore, the ability to converse more readily, share stories and acknowledge acceptance, has been one of the key objectives of the project and exhibition.

One of the core insights discovered was the role branding could take in helping reposition and re-label the visual and spoken language in the field. This is an area that will provide further research opportunity in future stages of the project.

Moving on from the exhibition, testing will soon be run with doctors and patient groups in developing countries to refine ideas and approach. Longer term, a new research group is planned within Falmouth University to continue this ever expanding field of social innovation design.

Dr Qingjun Chen (Anhui University) and Dr Barbara Wong (Jiangnan University) managed the Chinese teams in their two respective Universities and the two psychiatry leads in Cornwall were Dr Adrian Flynn and Dr Rohit Shankar.