Play & Learn on Mental Health is the first board game on youth mental health, designed to educate teenage players on mental health issues in a fun and interactive way.
Over 130 questions with 524 multiple-choice answers on topics such as the internet, bullying, eating disorders, anxiety disorders, youth offending, discrimination, personal perception and emotion management. These are issues that adolescents encounter in their daily lives, are concerned about them and often do not express their concerns because they fear stigmatisation by their peers.
The Athena-Social Care (now "Thalpos-Mental Health"), as a body active in the field of mental health, inspired this action in order to contribute substantially to the information and awareness of adolescents on mental health issues, as well as to the removal of the stigma surrounding it.
The basic targets of the initiative were:
The effective participation of young people at every stage of the implementation of an integrated action and treating them as a creative and integral part of it, moving away from the executive role usually assigned to them.
Developing non-formal learning methods and familiarising participants with the acquisition and use of such experiences, encouraging social cohesion.
Developing cooperative relationships between young people to take initiatives and innovative projects.
Strengthening information and awareness-raising activities on mental health issues and promoting mental health education for adolescents and those involved with them (parents, teachers, mental health professionals, public and private bodies).
This initiative was funded by the European Commission - Directorate-General for Education and Culture - Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency. The Managing Authority of the project was the Youth Institute - National Agency for the EU programmes "Youth in Action" and it lasted from July 2010 to February 2011.
