Week 11: Crazy Busy

The term is drawing to an end--just one week left before exams!--and the busyness that comes along with this time of the year is hitting me like a ton of bricks. A poster presentation next week, the ENGL 108D term paper, three finals (one per exam week), and a major thesis Progress Report worth 70% of my grade for the class. All in the next four weeks. Yikes.

I can't be sure whether it's because I'm now primed to see all of it, but I'm really noticing a lot of different events all around campus targeting stress relief. I do wonder if this term there's been an increase, especially since mental wellness has become more of a focal issue on campus.

What's interesting is realizing the kinds of thoughts I have when I come across the posters or booths. For example, I might see a poster and think, "Hey, awesome! Stress-relief colouring event!" Then, I'll walk past the table with colouring sheets and crayons and think, "Nope, can't stop by. Looks fun, but I'm crazy busy."

I wonder how many students go through a similar thought process as I do? Wanting to do stress-relieving activities, but feeling like there just isn't the time?

Thankfully, I do have items in my survey that target this issue. So, next term, I will hopefully get an answer to this question! Then, I'll have to figure out what campus services can do to help students who feel like they can't fit in the stress-relieving activities that are so important for one's mental health, and also one's success in university. My Physiological Psychology course just discussed the issue of long-term stress impacting memory: high levels cortisol, from lots of stress over time, damages brain cells in the hippocampus. The hippocampus is crucial for memory. And memory is crucial for studying. Gotta love when everything I learn ties together!

Week 10 - ORE is Submitted!

Remember how, back in Week 6, I mentioned that my ORE application deadline was set for December 1st?

Well, during my thesis class on Tuesday this week, I overheard a conversation about ORE between Katie and another one of my classmates. They were talking about the deadline that would be necessary to (hopefully) get approval by the end of the term--the end of this week.

I quickly jumped in.

Me: "Are you talking about ORE?"
Katie: "Yes, have you submitted yours yet?"
Me: "No... I was planning for December 1st..."

Katies eyes widen. "No, no, no, you need to submit it, like, yesterday. I challenge you to submit it by the end of this week."
Then my eyes widen. "Oh... Oh gosh...Welp."

So, needless to say, I was pretty busy from Tuesday until this morning completing my survey, putting it up online, creating all of the recruitment materials, and filling out the application form. (Thank goodness I have already filled out an ORE application form before, made the process much smoother!)

And now, a week and a half earlier than planned, it's done and submitted!

I made a few (slightly) last-minute changes to my survey. I was planning on having two scenarios in which a student might feel difficulty maintaining mental wellness. Then, for each scenario, I would present two different versions of "mental wellness information" (i.e., advice or information about services) and ask students to report their opinions/attitudes about the information. I would do a scenario with two versions "advice" information, and another with two versions of "services" information. One version would present information that might be more helpful and perceived more positively than the other, based on what research I've done so far.

I realized, however, that my survey had too many questions. A smaller number of questions means fewer responses are needed, and I certainly can't bank on an "overwhelming" response. So, I decided to scrap the question with "advice" information. I felt that, most likely, it ultimately wouldn't be too illuminating, since advice is so specific to the individual and the situation, but the "services" information would be more beneficial to my study.

Now, this weekend I have to catch up on everything I've set aside while I've been working on this application. *Angelic smile!*

Week 9 - Survey Decision, and a Relevant Event

So, have I come do a decision about my survey? Most likely!

I approached Katie and she didn't think print surveys would be a good idea at all--mainly because of the fact that I'd have to input all that data, by hand. It's way too much work. She suggested I ask our contact at the Office of Research Ethics, Sacha, who provided me with plenty of helpful suggestions as to how to distribute my survey, including Facebook posts, posters, and contacting departments to send out emails. I might also consider my supervisor's suggestion of reaching out to large classrooms to promote my survey. It's going to be a bit of work doing all the various distribution methods, but it's necessary for me to do well with this project (and it's much less tedious).

This week I tasked myself with completing (or at least drafting) the section of my ORE application that involves research methods, participants, and recruitment. I was a little confused about a few of the subsections, but my supervisor Wade helped to clear things up. What's great about this application process is that it really forces you to think through exactly what you're doing with this project; in other words, what you want to accomplish and all the steps you plan to take in order to meet that goal. Ideally I'll have the application completed before the end of November--better to aim early!

Today I'd like to go to a "Health Resources and Self-Care Awareness Event" at the SLC. If this doesn't sound relevant to my thesis, I don't know what is. I only have a short window of time to stop by, but I'd love to see what they're doing, and more specifically how they present their messages.

This was the message that went with their Facebook post, which was shared on my feed (sentence highlighted by me):

There are many resources available on campus to students who are struggling with a number of issues. Counselling, groups, resources...it's all here but it seems some students may not know where to find them. The UWaterloo Health and Self-Care Awareness Event will shed light on these resources and allow students to ask their questions in order to access the right resources for them. Join BSW students who seek to raise awareness about these services on Fri. Nov, 13, from 1:00- 3:00pm in the SLC. (Share your self-care strategies with the hashtag ‪#‎SWselfcare‬ to be entered into our draw to win "The Ultimate Self-Care Gift Basket" filled with goodies to treat yourself!) http://ow.ly/UqLEA ‪#‎SocialChangeProject2015‬

This really reiterates the issue of students not knowing how to access the resources on campus, and what I've presented in my project about how the resources do exist. While this event is great, I do think that my thesis project is still important in that my focus is on getting information about mental wellness to as many students as possible, and not necessarily just those who can attend an event (or wish to).

Week 8 - Survey Dilemma

This week my "thesis goal" was to complete a draft of the survey I will send out to students at UW and to complete section A of my ORE proposal. Well, the survey is... close to done, and I've drafted section A, so I just need to spend a bit more time (today, ideally) editing everything up. Which doesn't sound like much to do, but this week, everything--even the little stuff--has felt like a huge task that I have to force myself to accomplish instead of (a) sleeping or (b) panicking. Is is because of the time change last weekend that I'm just feeling totally thrown off lately?!

This, in its own coincidental way, speaks to the whole issue of student mental health. How am I supposed to be productive if I'm struggling to stay well? Which is why my thesis is so important, and why I'm passionate about it, and why I need to slug through all the less-fun tasks so that I can really try make a difference for students on campus.

Alternatively (or in addition to my mental wellness woes), it could also be the amazing weather we had over the past couple of days distracting me. T-shirt weather in November in Canada is pretty, well, un-Canadian.

One of the big decisions I have to make over the next few weeks is whether I'm going to distribute my survey electronically or using physical copies provided to classes. I honestly keep flip-flopping between the two, one moment totally convinced for the former, the next thinking the latter is best, then back again. I should really consider the pros and cons of each! Pros of electronic surveys are (1) all the data is already electronically coded upon completion, (2) I'll save money on printing (plus the trees!), (3) I don't have to approach classes, and (4) participants can respond on their own time. Pros of physical copies are (1) I'll get a lot of data all at once, (2) I'll very likely get a larger sample, and (3) I can do my best to get a diverse sample (among faculties, years, etc.). A major con of physical copies is that, with tons of data comes the task of entering all that data into the statistics software. Which is a tedious task for anyone, but I actually have wrist and finger issues that make it tricky to do a lot of typing. I'd be pretty nervous about that. I wonder if I could just hire someone to do it... I think I heard about an app for that kind of thing, actually. I'll have to look into it.

A big con of electronic surveys is figuring out how to distribute it effectively so I'll get enough respondents for statistically meaningful results. I should really ask Katie how students have done e-surveys in the past.

Week 7 - So Much Reading

Honestly, with all the reading I've been doing for my literature review, I don't know what I would do without Zotero. It's a software program that helps you organize all your references for a project, doing all that tedious bibliography work for you and keeping all the readings you've saved in one place. So much time has been saved, let me tell you!

During our meeting this week, my supervisor and I went over my research questions and how I want to address them in my survey. I don't think I've put my research questions up here on the blog, so I'll do that now.

With this research project, I hope to gain insight into the following three questions (taken from my detailed proposal):

1. What are students’ perceptions and attitudes regarding the current ways that MWI* is being communicated?
2. Through which media do students prefer to receive MWI?
3. How can MWI be communicated in an accessible way, such that UW undergraduate students not only receive the information, but also feel capable of making changes towards better mental well-being in the form of (a) developing new coping strategies and/or (b) seeking help from university services?

*MWI = Mental Wellness-related Information, which consists of (1) information about the services run by the university and its peer health groups, and (2) general mental wellness advice, such as coping strategies for stress.

We decided that the survey will be divided into five main sections:

1. Questions about opinions/perceptions/attitudes regarding mental wellness communication at UW.
2. Questions addressing students' familiarity with the mental wellness services on campus.
3. Questions about preferred methods of receiving mental wellness information.
4. Questions that involve hypothetical scenarios in which students will be given a scenario and relevant mental wellness information. For these questions, we'll look into self-reported attitudes and predicted behaviour.
5. Questions about general mental wellness issues related to students.

The focus of my literature review right now is to find out how health advice/information can be communicated effectively, which will help me develop the scenarios for section 4. A big issue with communicating about health is that services need to persuade their target audience to either use their service or to follow certain advice. One model of persuasive communication I've found really interesting is called the Matrix of Persuasion by William McGuire (Bettinghaus, 1986), which considers the various elements of the communication process (e.g., source, message, channel, receiver, destination) and the behavioural steps in attitude change (e.g., attention, comprehension, yielding, retention, action). I can look at all these factors to determine how to facilitate effective communication.

Another model I'd like to look into is the Health Belief Model, which I still need to look into, but looks promising!

Sources Cited

Bettinghaus, E. P. (1986). Health promotion and the knowledge-attitude-behavior continuum. Preventive Medicine, 15(5), 475–491.

Week 6 - Detailed Proposal is Submitted!

Just a few minutes ago, I wrapped up the finishing touches of my detailed project proposal and sent it to both Katie and my supervisor, Wade. If only I could feel relieved; instead, I'm nervous to see what Katie thinks...

I met with Wade again earlier this week, and we went over my proposal. He gave me some important reminders, including not to forget to cite any non-obvious statements (that aren't my own claims)! It takes a bit of thinking to realize what you may have said that seems like common knowledge to you, but might not be to the audience. For example, the statement that "student mental well-being is a major concern for universities." Having been exposed to my own mental health struggles and knowing many others who've had their own, I initially figured that it was something that everyone knows. In truth, I still need to back up the claim with a reference. Essentially, anything I'm not arguing as new information based on my research should be cited. Time to drill that into my brain!

Wade also helped me to set a deadline for when my ORE (Office of Research Ethics) proposal should be submitted: no later than December 1st. That gives me the rest of October (which is nearly over--oh how the time flies...) and all of November to fill out the ORE form and develop my survey. Both of which are pretty time-consuming tasks. Thankfully, I have the guidance of my supervisor (plus all the literature review to read through) to give me direction. I've also completed an ORE form before, so at least the process isn't a new one! Additionally, a progress report is due for Katie at the end of November, so I foresee that time as being very, very busy. 

As I mentioned in my last post, I still had plans to meet with someone from Health Services. That meeting happened yesterday, and it was incredibly useful. She gave me information about all of the peer health support groups run by Health Services (there are 11 in total!) and their various initiatives to promote wellness, including mental wellness. One interesting thing that she told me was HS wants students to understand that "any door is the right door"--in other words, if a student doesn't know where to go, they can show up in one spot and be guided to where they need to be. In one of the articles I read (Mowbray et. al, 2006), an issue the researchers discovered was that students would wander from place to place, unsure of where they're supposed to be. So, I think that it would be helpful to more effectively promote the idea of "any door is the right door," so that students are less confused and are more likely to seek help.

Sources Cited

Mowbray, C. T., Megivern, D., Mandiberg, J. M., Strauss, S., Stein, C. H., Collins, K., … Lett, R. (2006). Campus mental health services: Recommendations for change. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 76(2), 226.

Week 5 - So, how did all the meetings go?

Excellent news: I now have a supervisor! The meeting on Tuesday went well, and I am all set to work on my detailed proposal. As I didn’t have a supervisor by the “deadline” of last Friday, I get an extension of a few extra days to work on this proposal—a huge relief.

The meetings with the SSO and CS, as discussed in my Week 4 post, were also very successful. The staff I met with were very excited about my project and offered to help out as much as possible. I found out that CS and HS are undergoing an internal amalgamation of their services, in order to bridge them together as “Campus Wellness” and make them more accessible. They hope to hire a communications project manager as a 1-year role to improve all of the communication to students about the services that are available, wellness advice, and other wellness-related information.

I was told that this role won’t likely be hired until the Winter. So, in the meantime, I can begin my research of student’s perceptions and attitudes regarding mental wellness-related services and information on campus—this can give whoever is hired some data and suggestions to go off of when they begin their “overhaul” of the communication. This is a really cool opportunity!

Now that I have a supervisor to support the development of my project, as well as some great contacts with the student services at UW (I will also be meeting with HS sometime either late October or early November—as they have been busy planning Mental Health Awareness Day, I won’t be able to meet with them until then), it’s time for work on my detailed proposal to begin. This will include an abstract, a project description, an outline of methods, expected results and implications, a list of references, and a project plan.

Over the past few days I’ve been focusing on the literature review aspect of my thesis that will be summarized in my list of references. As my research topic pulls a lot of different areas together—university students, university services, communications, mental health/wellness, attitudes, and behaviours, to name the more focal topics—it is a bit of a challenge to find literature that bridges all (or many) of them together. Yesterday I met with a librarian at Dana Porter for some assistance with my research, and with a bit of digging we found a few good sources for me to look through.

There’s lots to do—looks like it’s going to be a busy weekend! Time to get writing, and with any luck there will be enough time for me to take a break to watch the Blue Jays.

Week 4 - Meeting Day

Fridays are normally fairly busy for me—8:30 am lecture, volunteering at the Environment Student Society’s coffee shop in the early afternoon, and later a Knowledge Integration seminar. Not extraordinarily busy, but hardly a day off.

How fortunate, then, was I that all three of my major Friday commitments were cancelled for the Thanksgiving long weekend? It was certainly cause for joy, especially since I’ve been so preoccupied with studying and coursework lately. (Plus, any reason not to have to wake up for a class first thing in the morning should be celebrated.)

However, just because one is freed of one’s regular commitments does not mean that all else can fall by the wayside. Especially when “all else” includes an honours thesis.

Today I ended up booking myself two meetings: one with the Student Success Office (SSO), and the other with Counselling Services (CS). My goal for each of these meetings is to learn more about how each of these services manages their communication with students. More specifically, I would like to know how they let students know about the mental health-related services they provide—not just to students with mental illnesses, but to the UW student population as a whole—and if/how they provide any sort of “general mental wellbeing advice”, which includes tips on managing stress and healthy living.

I did stop by CS (at Needles Hall) to ask the receptionist for more information, and she mentioned that they do not have anyone specifically “in charge” of communication to students. I don’t, truthfully, find this very surprising. Just yesterday I meandered to the upper level of the Health Services (HS) building and I found a whole area labelled “Mental Health”—turns out there’s an entire division of CS at HS. Who would have known? I also did not know, until digging through the HS and CS websites, that there was a “MATES Peer Mentors” program for any students who are struggling with their wellbeing.

Overall, I think I am well on my way to finding out, from a top-down level, how communication about mental health information is done at UW. What is still missing is an advisor who can help me tie it in with the bottom-up perspective of how students feel about the information that is communicated to them. I meet with a potential advisor next Tuesday, though (with the exception of one rejection email) I still have not heard from any of the other faculty I have contacted. Hopefully things work out with my meeting next week, otherwise I will be in a pretty tight bind as I have to submit a detailed proposal in just over a week’s time.

Week 3 - Preliminary Research a.k.a. Digging through UW Websites

As I was feeling stuck regarding whom to contact to potentially supervise my thesis, I decided to get some advice from my course instructor, Katie, at the beginning of this week. Since I want to look at how mental wellness information is currently being communicated by the university and how it can be improved, Katie recommended that I first get in touch with Counselling Services, or perhaps the Student Success Office, and find out who is involved in that particular job. That way, they can tell me what is being done and whether they’re looking for any improvements, and I can propose to them how I may be able to help. Then, I can contact a potential supervisor once I’ve narrowed down my aims for the project.

She also suggested that I take a closer look at what these services’ websites have to offer; this would give me a better idea of the areas that may need improvement. One thing that I found during this investigation was that the Counselling Services website can inform students of a lot of resources available to them; however, there are so many different links to look through and students may not be able to quickly find what they need. More importantly, students may not know what they need in the first place. The website has two main “categories” of resources – the services provided by Counselling Services itself (“Our Services”) and resources of other services (“Resources”). Under “Resources” is a list of links to “Campus Resources”, “Community Resources”, “Emergency Contacts”, “Student Groups and Other Resources”, and “President’s Office”. “Student Groups and Other Resources” links to self-help information, including help for individuals with mental health disorders as well as other students. What concerns me is how a student to (a) know to go to the Counselling Services website for information about self-help when they don’t believe they are experiencing serious mental health challenges, (b) find this information, and (c) decide that the advice is worthy of exploring.

I sent an email to Counselling Services on Wednesday, and I hope to hear from them soon. If not, I may have to go directly to them, as time is running out before I have to submit advisor information to Katie. A week from today, October 9, is the due date. I’ll have to consider also contacting the SSO, though I do think their website is generally much better organized than CS’s is. What I would likely target then is students’ attitudes towards the information the SSO shares and whether they are incorporating it. Do students use the tips they provide, or do they end up just going with the flow? Lots of possible research questions to consider…

Week 2 - Introduction

Hello and welcome to my blog, Sarah's KI Thesis Journal. While it's not a clever title, I feel it's the best way to encapsulate what I'll be writing about this term. I'm in my fourth year of Honours Knowledge Integration at UW, and the final requirement of this program is a yearlong Senior Thesis Project. The research project can be based in any discipline, or (oftentimes) a combination of more than one. While that may sound daunting, having such an open-ended project -- and it certainly does feel that way, as I describe below -- it allows us, as students in KI with various areas of interest, to each pursue a topic that we are truly passionate about. This blog for ENGL 108D, therefore, will document my process through my research project. It will also provide me with another venue to think through my thoughts related to this thesis and perhaps come up with new ideas as a result. It's really a win-win!

At this point in the game, the second week of classes is wrapping up, and while I do have a general idea of what kind of issue I'd like to investigate, I'm struggling with narrowing down the sort of approach I'd take. My current "topic" (term here used loosely) is tackling the communication of mental health advice to the general undergraduate student population, in order to promote self-help and mental well-being. I've discovered that I am passionate about issues surrounding mental health and the role of the university in preventing its students from struggling. Where I'm stuck, currently, is how I will more specifically look at this issue and solve it. I have considered researching from a health communication view, a social psychological view (specifically attitudes and behaviour), and a design thinking view (a method of complex problem-solving I learned in my first year of KI). I've considered doing a combination of all three. The biggest consequence of being uncertain of my disciplinary approach, however, is that I have very little idea whom to contact to potentially become a supervisor. Thus, my aim for this coming week is to tighten up my approach and send out some more emails to faculty members.