The Digital Youth X MindTech event 'Digital Risk, Resilience and Interventions: co-creating change in youth mental health' took place at London's Southbank County Hall on Thursday 13th November. The conference welcomed over 200 delegates including researchers, young people, policy makers, academics, industry innovators and parents for a series or talks and interactive workshops. The event also dedicated a space to an exhibition showcasing the various Digital Youth project findings, bringing together all the incredible work from the Digital Youth team.

Professor Chris Hollis, Director of MindTech and joint lead of Digital Youth, reflected on the event’s success "this event exemplifies the power of collaboration in research for youth mental health. Keynote talks from Prof Amy Orben and Prof Cathy Creswell were a real highlight, providing insights into the biggest challenges that we face around the risks and benefits of digital technology for young people."

Prof Ellen Townsend, Joint Lead of Digital Youth and MindTech Children and Young People’s Theme Co-lead also reflected on the day "by bringing together leading researchers, industry partners, and—most importantly—the voices of young people through our Sprouting Minds group, Digital Youth has delivered evidence and interventions that have the potential to transform youth mental health. It was wonderful to see so many people at the event including policy makers, charity representatives, and researchers at all career stages."

Throughout the day, the talks were interwined with interactive elements such as panel discussions, workshops and industry demonstrations. Digital Youth wanted to ensure the event provided a space that encouraged an open conversation and allowed delegates to offer insight into their own perspectives. The workshops on offer also allowed attendees to refine their experience by choosing a workshop of interest to them. MindTech's placement research student Eve attended the workshop, Creative Approaches in Research and Patient and Public Involvement (PPI), and said the workshop "revealed to me the amount of thought and intention that goes into the name, logo, and posters for a research project, as well as defeating the stereotype that science and creativity are mutually exclusive. In attempting to create our own designs in only 10 minutes, we collectively concluded that it is much more difficult than a quick job, but we do have the ability and resources to do it – despite not being graphic designers."

Although the UKRI funded project Digital Youth is coming to a close after 4 years, aspects of the day looked forward to how Digital Youth's work can be taken forward by NIHR HealthTech Research Centre Mental Health (MindTech). Digital Youth became an international collaboration spanning digital risk, resilience, interventions and responsible research innovation, involving 12 universities from the UK and New Zealand. Young people have been central to shaping Digital Youth with the involvement of a young person’s advisory group, Sprouting Minds. The team hope this co-creation can continue to be at the forefront of the project's future along with the international connections made during the project's span.

Prof Ellen Townsend said "the launch of the MRC Digital Youth programme’s final report marks a significant milestone in evidence-based practice... we’re excited within the MindTech Children and Young People’s theme to build on the work of Digital Youth"

Prof Hollis continued, "looking ahead, the announcement of our new MindTech Bridge initiative signals an exciting future—building stronger connections between researchers and innovators so we can deliver real-world impact."

Our placement research student Eve wrote a full piece for the Institute of Mental Health blog about their experience attending the conference

Read Eve’s piece ‘My experience at the Digital Youth X MindTech conference'

To find out more about the Digital Youth projects, read the project report

Read the Digital Youth project report on their website