How museums can support young people's mental health and wellbeing - Kids in Museums

How museums can support young people's mental health and wellbeing - Kids in Museums
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How museums can support young people’s mental health and wellbeing
How museums can support young people’s mental health and wellbeing
Kids in Museums believes that museums can play a valuable role in supporting young people’s mental health and wellbeing. Everyone has mental health, but we often only talk about it when it becomes a problem.
A collaborative collage artwork made at Craft Under the Mast, a series of free, social events for young people aimed at reducing social isolation, developed by the Kids in Museums Youth Panel.
Estimated reading time: 13 minutes.
Kids in Museums believes that museums can play a valuable role in supporting young people’s mental health and wellbeing. Everyone has mental health, but we often only talk about it when it becomes a problem.
Museums can support young people to maintain good mental health and a positive sense of wellbeing, providing protection from factors such as stress. They also have something to offer to people who are experiencing a range of mental health problems, from short-term museum-based projects to programmes in hospital settings. All of this work is equally valuable to young people.
Thank you to Victoria Hume, Executive Director, Culture Health and Wellbeing Alliance (CHWA) and Dr Nuala Morse, Associate Professor in Museum Studies at the School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester for their support in creating this resource.
Quick links
Young people’s mental health and wellbeing in the UK
Why do this work?
Partnerships and planning
Types of practice
Staff, facilitators, artists and volunteers
Signposting
General visitors
One-off or short term projects
Longer term and more in-depth programmes
Evaluation tools
Further reading
Young people’s mental health and wellbeing in the UK
The
World Health Organisation
defines mental health as “a state of mental wellbeing that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, realise their abilities, learn well and work well, and contribute to their community.” Their concept of mental health explains that everyone has it and experiences it individually, usually on a spectrum. There are multiple factors that both protect people from mental health problems and cause them.
The Children and Young People’s Mental Health Coalition’s most recent
review of NHS mental health statistics
shows that the proportion of 8-25s experiencing mental health problems is increasing.
About 20% of 8-25 year olds were experiencing mental health problems. This rate is slightly higher for those over the age of 17.
In 2017 around 10% of 17-19s experienced mental health problems; now the proportion is 25.7%.
Only half of children and young people experiencing mental health problems were able to access treatment.
Groups that disproportionately experience mental health problems include autistic young people, refugees and asylum seekers, young people from certain minority ethnic backgrounds in particular Black boys and young men and young people from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Recent research from Young Minds
illustrates how social, cultural, environmental and political factors come together to affect young people’s mental health. 81% of young people believe that wider society has a negative impact on their mental health.
Young people are also experiencing some of the lowest levels of wellbeing in Europe, according to the
Good Childhood Report
by the Children’s Society. The report identifies school and schoolwork, appearance, friends and family as key areas that influence children and young people’s wellbeing.
Mental health problems are not inherently a safeguarding issue. As with all projects with young people it’s important you’re aware of where they fit into your safeguarding processes and that you conduct an appropriate risk assessment. If you’re working with young people with existing mental health problems, you should always ensure you’re working in partnership with mental health professionals who will be able to support with safeguarding and risk assessment questions. (See partnerships below).
Mental Health Services for Children and Young People
It is widely acknowledged that there is a crisis in the provision of mental health support for children and young people.
Mental health services for children and young people can be provided:
In schools, Mental Health Support Teams provided by the local NHS support early intervention. Many schools offer free counselling services and are integrating mental health and wellbeing into the curriculum.
By the NHS including access to self-help resources, social prescribing (see below) a range of outpatient therapies, specialist mental health wards and hospitals and referrals to other services such as social care. These services may be referred to as CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) or CYPMHS (Children and Young People’s Mental Health Services).
By local and national charities that provide a range of services including helplines, counselling and other therapies, peer support groups and online resources.
Why do this work?
In 2024,
the Children’s Society
called for young people’s mental health to be a ‘national priority’. Young people themselves are incredibly concerned about mental health. Charities such as Young Minds are calling for new approaches to supporting young people’s mental health including expanding creative therapies, providing safe spaces for young people to meet and empowering them to take care of their own wellbeing.
There is an established evidence base that shows museum and heritage programmes can have a positive impact on social isolation, confidence, stress and anxiety and offer support for adults recovering from more severe mental health problems.
Where evidence for young people is available, such as the case studies in
Creatively Minded at the Museum
, a report by the Baring Foundation and the Museums Association, there are promising signs of positive impact.
The report also highlights the accessibility of this work for museums. The authors suggest that with the right partners from local NHS services and/ or charities, any museum can deliver this much-needed work.
Partnerships and planning
CHWA’s
Creative Health Quality Framework
provides guidance and support to think through the whole process of designing, delivering and evaluating creative health projects. Using it will ensure you are considering all the factors that come together to make a high quality project and build your confidence in this area of work.
For any projects that go beyond short-term work with young people without existing mental health problems or young people as general visitors, partnerships are essential. Potential partners are likely to come from:
Local NHS services such as CAMHS, Recovery Colleges, health centres or hospital charities.
Local branches of national mental health charities such as Mind or smaller local charities that support young people’s mental health.
Arts and health charities – this is a growing area and there are many local and regional organisations. For more information,
get in touch with CHWA
who will connect you with the relevant
Regional Champion
who can advise you about potential partnership.
Art Therapists.
You can find out about local NHS mental health services on the
NHS website
and you can use
Hub of Hope
to identify local charities. Reviewing the case studies in the Creatively Minded at the Museum report, the author suggests that museums are more often initiating partnerships than the NHS or charities.
Types of practice
Coproduction
Coproduction
is increasingly recognised as a valuable approach to working with people experiencing mental health problems. The
Reach in Reach Out (RIRO) project
run by Arts and Health South West took this approach to delivering a creative volunteering and wellbeing project which brought young people together with a range of partners including museums, artists and researchers. The evaluation shows many benefits to the young people involved, including increased wellbeing and reduced social isolation.
The installation,
Oh My Gosh, You’re Wellcome…Kitten
which is part of the ten year Being Human exhibition at the Wellcome Collection, was coproduced with young people on the mental health ward at Great Ormond Street Hospital. They collaborated with a designer, curator and artist and nurses to create the installation which reflects environments that made them feel less stressed, improved their wellbeing and would form part of an ideal mental health ward.
If you want to use coproduction in projects, you need to consider the additional time needed to work in this way as part of your planning.
Social prescribing
Social prescribing
connects people with local services, activities and community groups that meet social, emotional or practical needs that affect their wellbeing. According to the NHS, this is particularly effective for people who feel lonely or isolated or who are experiencing mild mental health problems. Although it is suitable for all ages, social prescribing is better developed for adults than for young people.
This study from the Social Behavioural Research Group
shows the positive impact of social prescribing on young people waiting for NHS mental health treatment.
There are clear opportunities for museums to support social prescribing. Currently, relatively few are involved, particularly in projects for young people. The Pitt Rivers Museum and Oxford University Museum of Natural History worked on a
pilot project
in 2023 with social prescribers and a local charity to connect young people with moderate mental health problems to creative activities, hobbies and groups activities. There were many positive impacts for the young people involved including increased confidence, sense of connection and finding it easier to return to school.
Staff
, facilitators,
artists
and volunteers
Projects supporting young people with mental health problems can be emotionally challenging and it’s essential that staff, volunteers, facilitators and artists are well-supported to take care of their own mental health and wellbeing. They should be offered relevant training and support, and managers should be proactive in ensuring this is available. GLAM Cares has a selection of
staff wellbeing
and
self-help
resources.
It’s important that people delivering projects understand and maintain healthy boundaries and do not fall into roles that should be taken by trained mental health professionals. We have a resource on
Creating Healthy Boundaries
To equip staff to support each other and general visitors and to feel confident in conversations with young people involved in projects, you might want to consider
Mental Health First Aid
training. Training can be costly, but some local councils and charities such as local branches of Mind offer free or discounted rates for charities.
Trauma informed practice
Young Minds identifies trauma informed practice as essential to developing mental health provision for young people. In museums staff and volunteers are likely to encounter general visitors and programme participants who have been affected by trauma. Encounters with objects linked to painful stories can be triggering. Manchester Art Gallery has become a
trauma informed art gallery
There are a range of providers of trauma informed practice training, including
Kazzum
, which specialises in training for arts and cultural organisations
Signposting
This
blog from the National Lottery Heritage Fund
has some tips for supporting young people’s wellbeing. If the young people involved in your projects are looking for more support, signposting to local and national charities is a great option. You could use Hub of Hope to create a resource list of local organisations for staff to refer to.
Many young people prefer digital help and support. There are some national organisations that offer this.
Childline
(online counselling up to age 18)
Kooth
(range of online services for young people)
SHOUT
(crisis text service)
Samaritans
(email and webchat for any age)
The Mix
(online discussions and counselling up to age 25)
General visitors
2019 Art Fund research
shows that young people like to visit museums and galleries to de-stress. Museums can offer young people visiting independently opportunities to increase their sense of wellbeing through self-directed activities. These often use the
Five Ways to Wellbeing
particularly ‘take notice’ as a starting point.
The projects outlined below were not specifically designed with young people in mind, but will be applicable to 16 – 25 year olds.
For its
Room to Breathe exhibition
, Manchester Art Gallery has created an audio guide to enable visitors to explore objects mindfully. The
Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art
has published tips about how to look at some of their exhibitions mindfully, which might be useful if you’re thinking about creating activities for your museum.
If you have outdoor space on your site, a wellbeing focused trail could be a good way to encourage people to spend time outdoors. The Horniman Museum and Gardens has created a
wellbeing wander
for its grounds.
Barnsley Museums
have a number of mindful activities for use around their outdoor spaces.
Feeling a sense of belonging is an important component of wellbeing. Creating a welcoming environment where visitors feel safe can help create this feeling in a museum. It might take a long time to build these relationships, but it is valuable work as this
case study from Leeds City Museums
demonstrates.
Recovery Colleges are designed to be inclusive places where people who are experiencing a range of mental health problems to learn new skills and building confidence. The
Online Recovery College
has a course about how museums and galleries can support wellbeing which is free to access.
One-off or short-term projects
Offering one-off drop in activities can be a good way to support young people’s wellbeing or young people with mild to moderate mental health problems. It can be an opportunity to try new partnerships and build staff skills.
You could dip your toe in the water by running a drop-in creative event supporting one or more of the five ways of wellbeing as part of:
Creativity and Wellbeing Week
Mental Health Awareness Week
World Mental Health Day
Museums such as the
Old Operating Theatre
have run events series for these weeks.
Loneliness is a huge problem for young people and can when unaddressed lead to mental health problems.
Young people aged 16-29
are more likely to feel lonely than any other age group. The Kids in Museums Youth Panel developed
Craft Under the Mast
, a series of drop in creative workshops, to enable young people to build new social connections in a welcoming, alcohol free space. Nottingham Contemporary runs regular
Slow Craft Socials
for young people and Doncaster Museums run
History, Heritage and Happiness
to combat loneliness in the town.
Looking at slightly longer-term programmes,
Tackling the Blues
, a partnership between Tate Liverpool, Edge Hill University and the Everton in the Community Foundation, aimed to promote conversations about the five ways to wellbeing, using Creation Stations in the gallery across a whole summer. The Creation Stations were all staffed by Tackling the Blues mentors to help promote wellbeing messages alongside creative activities. The
Summer of Love at Yorkshire Sculpture Park
explored connection, belonging and identity which are key supporting factors for young people’s wellbeing.
Longer term and more in-depth programmes
There are a range of longer-term options to help young people maintain a positive sense of wellbeing or support young people experiencing mental health problems.
Volunteering
Volunteering can help young people build a sense of connection and learn new skills, supporting at least two of the five ways to wellbeing. The
2024 Youth Census
shows that wellbeing is an important motivation for young people to volunteer. The RIRO toolkit (referenced above) outlines ways to create volunteering opportunities to support young people’s wellbeing. Museum Development South West has a
toolkit
about connecting with student volunteers.
Partnerships with charities and mental health services
The
ICE Heritage Project
ran in partnership with four Hampshire museums. It was designed to reduce the number of young people already known to CAMHS accessing crisis support and to help them to find their own path to wellbeing. The programme had many positive outcomes, building connections, trying new things and feeling more confident. Participants also started to see their local museums as safe, welcoming spaces.
In partnership with Wiltshire NHS Partnership, the
Holburne Museum in Bath
runs a programme of small groups, including for young people, that enable people experiencing mental health problems to engage with heritage and creativity. The museum works to offer progression routes after the groups end.  A wide range of charities and NHS services refer people to the groups.
Dulwich Picture Gallery has run a range of projects with their local health centre and mental health trust. These have included
Together Through Art
, which aimed to reduce the stigma surrounding mental health problems. The programme trained young people who had previous contact with mental health services to share how they had used creativity to support their wellbeing with other children and young people who live in local London boroughs.
Work in Mental Health Hospitals
There are also a few museums working in mental health wards, primarily using museum objects. In the
Grand Challenges Adolescent Lives
programme, UCL staff took museum objects and activities into adolescent mental health wards. Handling museum objects made the young people feel valued and the conversations around the objects created a safe space that reduced the stigma of admission.
The
Foundling Museum
recently ran a pilot project with an artist facilitating sessions in an inpatient unit for young people with complex mental health needs in Newham, London. The sessions focused on the Foundling Museum’s history and culture of care. The museum also has an ongoing partnership with its local branch of the charity Mind in Camden.
Online activities
Leaving the house can be a barrier to young people experiencing mental health problems engaging with museums and creative projects. Offering online activities is a good way to support this group. In Oxford, the
Origin project
is a collaboration between the university, museums and the local NHS trust. It will create online museum experiences co-produced with young people designed to help with positive mental health and wellbeing.
Evaluation tools
As well as co-producing programmes, it can also be valuable to work with young people to design evaluation frameworks for arts and mental health programmes. This approach was part of the RIRO project mentioned earlier in the resource.
The Centre for Cultural Value has published some
evaluation principles
to help you make sure the evaluation is meaningful to you and your participants. CHWA has a
resource on evaluation here
. UCL has published a
wellbeing evaluation toolkit
for projects about wellbeing in museums. This includes a wellbeing umbrella evaluation tool designed for use with young people.
Further reading
Children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing
Infant Mental Health – Voice of the Infant and Best Practice Pledge
NSPCC – Guide to Children’s Mental Health
Young Minds resources about young people’s mental health
Mental health services for children and young people
NHS mental health care for children and young people
Young Minds A-Z Mental Health Guide
Place 2 Be Counselling in Schools
Mental Health Charities supporting children and young people
Evidence for the impact of museum projects on mental health and wellbeing
What Works Wellbeing – Heritage and Wellbeing
Museums as Spaces for Health and Wellbeing
Evidence summary from Historic England
Building partnerships and planning
This podcast series from North East Museums
works through the stages of building partnerships with mental health services
Find out more about your local arts and health charities
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries
Social prescribing
London Arts and Health’s Social Prescribing Myth Buster
HWA information about social prescribing
Street Games lead the national
Social Prescribing Youth Network
and offer a wide range of online resources.
National Academy for Social Prescribing
Longer term projects
Reframing Mental Health in Museums and Galleries conference resources
2.8 Million Minds
Manifesto for using creativity and culture to support young people’s mental health
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