YOUTH STUDY INFORMATION AND E-CONSENT FORM

This study is Funded by the Saint Justine Hospital Foundation Grant Fund

A team of researchers from across Canada are conducting a project to evaluate the feasibility of the online adaptation of the PreVenture program. The PreVenture program involves delivering specialised coping skills group workshops to young people. The program is usually delivered in-person, however in response to the COVID-19 pandemic the program has recently been updated to be delivered online, using a secure online video conferencing and digital platform. The goal of this study is to compare the program experiences of around 500 young people, like yourself, who are attending high schools and/or accessing mental health services across Canada.

Who is leading this study (who are the study investigators and co-investigators)?

The overall study is led by Dr Patricia Conrod, a clinical psychologist and professor at Sainte-Justine Hospital and the University of Montreal. Dr Steve Mathias from Providence Health Care and the University of British Columbia is the principal investigator of the Foundry BC site along with Dr Skye Barbic of Foundry and University of British Columbia as co-investigator.

What is the purpose of this study?

The main purpose of this study is to evaluate the feasibility, acceptability, and short-term impact of the PreVenture program when it is delivered to young people across Canada through either an online video conferencing and digital platform or an in-person format.

What would be involved?

If you agree to participate in the study, you will be invited to complete a de-identified, online survey on your personality, strengths and weaknesses, different health-related behaviours, experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic and learning style. This survey will take approximately 45-60 minutes to complete.

Depending on your survey results, you may then be invited to participate in the Preventure program either online or in-person. PreVenture involves two brief group workshop sessions where you will learn about life skills, goal setting and reaching those goals. If you participate in the workshop sessions, you will be asked to provide feedback on your experience of participating in the PreVenture program through an anonymous, online short feedback survey. This survey takes approximately 10 minutes to complete.

If you complete the workshops, you will also be invited to participate in a similar version of the de-identified, online survey you completed before the program on your personality, strengths and weaknesses, different health-related behaviours, experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic and learning style. This version of the survey will have a few extra questions that ask about your use of the workshop content since your workshop to better understand if these resources are useful and whether it’s helpful to have access to them even after the workshop. This survey will take approximately 45-60 minutes to complete.

What are the online PreVenture workshops?

The in-person PreVenture workshop sessions will be provided by school staff trained as PreVenture facilitators. The online PreVenture workshop sessions will be provided by Foundry Virtual councillors trained as PreVenture facilitators. The Foundry Virtual facilitators have received specific training on how to deliver the PreVenture workshops online. Through the workshops, you will get the chance to interact with other young people around your age. The workshops are designed to: motivate you to understand where some of your emotional and behavioural reactions may come from; enable you to develop skills to better focus your strengths and weaknesses towards your goals; and provide you with tools to better manage challenging situations.

The in-person workshop sessions will be delivered at your school during school hours and all workshop participants will receive a paper-copy manual that contains the workshop content. The online workshop sessions will be delivered using an online video conference platform and all workshop participants will receive access to digital manuals that contain the workshop content. In order to register and access the online workshops, you will have to download the Foundry Virtual app. A member of the Foundry team will support you to download the app when they contact you to confirm your registration in the workshops.

If your survey results show that you may not benefit as much from this particular program, a member of the study team will still get in touch to let you know about other great programs and supports that are available to you through Foundry Virtual or through other services in BC.

What are the benefits to participating in this study?

The contributions of all participants in this study are invaluable. This study would not be possible without the time and input of the young people taking part. Your input will be of great value in trying to identify the health and wellbeing experiences of young people. A number of studies have shown that young people who participate in the PreVenture program workshops report reduced drug use, binge drinking and mental health problems over a two-year period, relative to those who do not. The program also aims to provide young people with coping skills that can help them in other aspects of their academic lives.

What are the risks to participating in this study?

There are no expected physical risks to being involved in this study or in any PreVenture workshops. We believe that risks to your psychological and/or emotional well-being are minimal but could involve possible discomfort from responding to survey questions about your mental health, substance use and overall emotional state. You will be provided with a list of available resources in case you experience some distress or discomfort when participating in the study.

Is my participation in this study voluntary?

Yes, your participation in the study is entirely voluntary. This means that you do not have to answer any survey questions or take part in any workshop activities that you are not comfortable with. You can also choose to end your participation in the study at any point, without having to provide reasons. If you choose to end your participation, this will not impact your school standing nor your experience of or access to other Foundry services or any other mental health services.

How will my privacy be protected?

The study team is committed to protecting the privacy and confidentiality of all participants in the study. In order to ensure the privacy of young people participating in the online PreVenture workshop sessions, the video recording feature of the video conference platform will be disabled as will the ability to export or copy content from the chat. Young people will also be encouraged to wear headphones and to find a quiet and private space to join the sessions from. In both the online and the in-person group workshops we encourage all participants to refrain from disclosing the contents of the discussion outside of the group workshop; however, we cannot control what other participants do with the information discussed.

All information collected during the study will remain completely confidential, as is required by research standards and as permitted by law. All personal information will be protected by replacing names with unique research codes (numbers). These codes will be securely stored under the responsibility of the principal investigator at the Sainte-Justine Hospital for at least 5 years after the end of the study, at which time they will be destroyed. Only authorized research team members will have access to these codes and to the survey data.

All study data will be stored collected, transferred and stored on a secure server based out of Montreal, Canada using a program called Psytools that is owned and operated by a research technology and service company called Delois. The research team has agreements in place ensure this data is owned by the research team and that restricts access to this data only to authorized team members.

Any personal information we collect will be kept confidential and private. Only in situations where a participant indicates that they are at risk of harm to themselves or others will we connect a participant’s survey data back to the personal information for that young person, so that a Foundry service provider can contact them in order to offer them support. All participants will also be provided with information about supports services available across the province at the end of the survey and reminded that Foundry Virtual services are available if they feel they need support, information, or someone to talk to.

The findings from the study will not be reported or shared in a way that would identify any individual participant. When information from this study is published or presented, your name and other personal information will never be used.

How will my study data be used and by who?

Only approved members of the research team at the Foundry Pilot site and the Montreal coordinating research site will have access to the anonymous survey data completed by young people in BC. None of the other participating study sites or researchers will have access to this data. This study data will be used to understand how the online version of the PreVenture program is working and how it be improved. The PreVenture program team will use this information to improve the program’s format, content and delivery. The results of this study will also be published by the research team in journal articles, presented at conferences, and shared with the public through community events, and online / social media channels, including the Foundry social media channels and webpage.

Who can I contact if I have questions about the study?

If you or someone you know has any questions or concerns about the study, you can always contact Skye Barbic, the OPFS study Research Coordinator at Foundry by email (sbarbic@foundrybc.ca) or call at 778-846-6134.

If you’d prefer, you can also contact the lead investigator for the Foundry study site in British Columbia, Dr. Steve Mathias:

Foundry Central Office

915-1045 Howe Street, Vancouver, BC V6Z 2A9 

Email: smathias@foundrybc.ca

Call: 778-883-5583

Or you can contact the lead researcher for the entire national study, Dr Patricia Conrod:

Centre de Recherche, CHU Ste-Justine

3175 Côte-Ste-Catherine, Montréal, QC, H3T 1C5

Email : patricia.conrod@recherche-ste-justine.qc.ca

Call: 514-345-4931 (extension 4051)

If you would like to learn more about the PreVenture program please visit the program website: www.preventure.ca.

If you have any concerns or complaints about your rights as a research participant and/or your experiences while participating in this study, contact the Research Participant Complaint Line in the UBC Office of Research Ethics at 604-822-8598 or if long distance e-mail RSIL@ors.ubc.ca or call toll free 1-877-822-8598. Please provide the study number for the OPFS study (H21-00328) so that they can better assist you.

At any point in the study, if the researcher becomes aware that there has been abuse and/or neglect of a child (or that there is a risk of such occurring in the future) please be advised that the researcher must, by law, report this information to the appropriate authorities.