Building a Mental Health Supportive Campus Through Psychoeducation: Collaboration Between UNJ and PCU India
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21009/sarwahita.232.05Keywords:
mental health psychoeducation, mental health literacy, Psychological First Aid, Mental Health First Aid, university studentsAbstract
Student mental health has become an important issue in higher education, as academic and non-academic demands can affect students' psychological well-being, learning processes, and academic performance. Limited mental health literacy highlights the need for promotive and preventive interventions. This community engagement program aimed to improve students' knowledge and awareness of mental health through a Mental Health Psychoeducation program integrating Mental Health Literacy (MHL), Psychological First Aid (PFA), and Mental Health First Aid (MHFA). The program was conducted on 5 August 2026 at Pimpri Chinchwad University (PCU), Pune, India, involving 142 undergraduate students from various academic disciplines. Program effectiveness was evaluated using a single-group pre-test–post-test design. The results showed that the mean knowledge score increased from 9.54 to 10.22 (out of a maximum score of 15), indicating an improvement in participants' understanding of the topics presented. Knowledge gains were observed across all three measured domains, with the greatest improvement in Psychological First Aid (PFA). These findings suggest that Mental Health Psychoeducation has the potential to serve as an effective promotive strategy for enhancing university students' knowledge and awareness of mental health. However, the findings should be interpreted in light of the limitations of a single-group pre-test–post-test design without a comparison group and an evaluation that assessed only short-term changes in knowledge.
References
Aguirre Velasco, A., Cruz, I. S. S., Billings, J., Jimenez, M., & Rowe, S. (2022). Barriers and facilitators to mental health help-seeking among young adults: A systematic review. Journal of American College Health.
Auerbach, R. P., et al. (2018). WHO World Mental Health Surveys International College Student Project: Prevalence and distribution of mental disorders. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 127(7), 623–638.
Bantjes, J., Geldenhuys, M., Van Zyl, M., Page, D. T., Weis, J., Louw, K. A., Shadwell, R., & Hunt, X. (2026). Developing, piloting, and evaluating a psychological first aid training for medical students in South Africa. BMC medical education, 26(1), 295. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-026-08616-x
Burns, S., Crawford, G., Hallett, J., Hunt, K., Chih, H. J., & Tilley, P. J. (2017). What's wrong with John? a randomised controlled trial of Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) training with nursing students. BMC psychiatry, 17(1), 111. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-017-1278-2
Cherian, A. V., et al. (2025). Mental health, suicidality, health, and social indicators among college students across nine states in India. Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine.
Davies, E. B., Beever, E., & Glazebrook, C. (2018). A pilot randomised controlled study of the mental health first aid eLearning course with UK medical students. BMC medical education, 18(1), 45. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-018-1154-x
Donker, T., Griffiths, K. M., Cuijpers, P., & Christensen, H. (2009). Psychoeducation for depression, anxiety and psychological distress: a meta-analysis. BMC medicine, 7, 79. https://doi.org/10.1186/1741-7015-7-79
Dzemaili, S., Pasquier, J., Oulevey Bachmann, A., & Mohler-Kuo, M. (2023). The Effectiveness of Mental Health First Aid Training among Undergraduate Students in Switzerland: A Randomized Control Trial. International journal of environmental research and public health, 20(2), 1303. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20021303
Ebert, D. D., Franke, M., Kählke, F., Küchler, A. M., Bruffaerts, R., Mortier, P., Karyotaki, E., Alonso, J., Cuijpers, P., Berking, M., Auerbach, R. P., Kessler, R. C., Baumeister, H., & WHO World Mental Health - International College Student collaborators (2019). Increasing intentions to use mental health services among university students. Results of a pilot randomized controlled trial within the World Health Organization's World Mental Health International College Student Initiative. International journal of methods in psychiatric research, 28(2), e1754. https://doi.org/10.1002/mpr.1754
Farrer, L. M., Gulliver, A., Katruss, N., Fassnacht, D. B., Kyrios, M., & Batterham, P. J. (2019). A novel multi-component online intervention to improve the mental health of university students: Randomised controlled trial of the Uni Virtual Clinic. Internet interventions, 18, 100276. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.invent.2019.100276
Hood, B., Jelbert, S., & Santos, L. R. (2021). Benefits of a psychoeducational happiness course on university student mental well-being both before and during a COVID-19 lockdown. Health psychology open, 8(1), 2055102921999291. https://doi.org/10.1177/2055102921999291
Jorm, A. F., & Kitchener, B. A. (2011). Mental Health First Aid Manual. Mental Health First Aid Australia.
Kitchener, B. A., & Jorm, A. F. (2002). Mental health first aid training for the public: evaluation of effects on knowledge, attitudes and helping behavior. BMC psychiatry, 2, 10. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-244x-2-10
Kutcher, S., Wei, Y., & Coniglio, C. (2016). Mental Health Literacy: Past, Present, and Future. Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie, 61(3), 154–158. https://doi.org/10.1177/0706743715616609
Lukens, E. P., & McFarlane, W. R. (2004). Psychoeducation as evidence-based practice: Considerations for practice, research, and policy. Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention, 4(3), 205–225. https://doi.org/10.1093/brief-treatment/mhh019
Luo, Y., Zhang, M. Effectiveness of a blended learning program for enhancing mental health literacy among university students: a randomized educational study. BMC Psychol 14, 1157 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-04920-9
Morgan, A. J., Ross, A., & Reavley, N. J. (2018). Systematic review and meta-analysis of Mental Health First Aid training: Effects on knowledge, stigma, and helping behaviour. PloS one, 13(5), e0197102. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0197102
Primasari, I., Hoeboer, C. M., Sijbrandij, M., & Olff, M. (2025). A web-based psychoeducational programme for trauma-related symptoms in Indonesian undergraduate students: a pilot randomized controlled trial. European journal of psychotraumatology, 16(1), 2535082. https://doi.org/10.1080/20008066.2025.2535082
Rasha Salah Eweida, Zohour Ibrahim Rashwan, Leena Mohammad Khonji, Abdullah Abdulrahman Bin Shalhoub, Nashwa Ibrahim. (2023). Psychological first aid intervention: rescue from psychological distress and improving the pre-licensure nursing students’ resilience amidst COVID-19 crisis and beyond. Scientific African. Volume 19.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sciaf.2022.e01472.
Reis, A. C., et al. (2022). The impact of mental health literacy training programs on university students: A systematic review. Prevention Science, 23(4), 648–662.
Rodríguez-Rivas ME, Cangas AJ and Fuentes-Olavarría D (2021) Controlled Study of the Impact of a Virtual Program to Reduce Stigma Among University Students Toward People With Mental Disorders. Front. Psychiatry 12:632252. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2021.632252
Tanto, A. C., Folamauk, C. L. H., Wijaya, R. P. C., & Handoyo, N. E. (2025). Peer teaching in Psychological First Aid Training to promote students’ self-efficacy: A pilot randomised control trial. Mental Health & Prevention, 37, Article 200396. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mhp.2025.200396
Tay, J. L., Goh, Y. S. S., Sim, K., & Klainin-Yobas, P. (2022). Impact of the HOPE Intervention on Mental Health Literacy, Psychological Well-Being and Stress Levels amongst University Undergraduates: A Randomised Controlled Trial. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(15), 9772. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19159772
United Nations. (2015). Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Wei, Y., McGrath, P. J., Hayden, J., & Kutcher, S. (2015). Mental health literacy measures evaluating knowledge, attitudes and help-seeking: A scoping review. BMC Psychiatry, 15, 291.
Wei, Y., Hayden, J. A., Kutcher, S., Zygmunt, A., & McGrath, P. (2013). The effectiveness of school mental health literacy programs to address knowledge, attitudes and help seeking among youth. Early intervention in psychiatry, 7(2), 109–121. https://doi.org/10.1111/eip.12010
World Health Organization. (2022). World Mental Health Report: Transforming Mental Health for All.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Iriani Indri Hapsari, Dewinta Ariani, Kahfi Hizbullah, Nanda Putri Adhiningtyas, Irma Rosalinda, Ruchu Kuthiala, Santosh S. Sonavane, Saurabh Chavan, Darriel Rasya, Azka Karimah, Irma Septi
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Copyright Notice
Sarwahita allow the author(s) to hold the copyright without restrictions and allow the author(s) to retain publishing rights without restrictions. Sarwahita CC-BY or an equivalent license as the optimal license for the publication, distribution, use, and reuse of scholarly work. In developing strategy and setting priorities, Sarwahita recognize that free access is better than priced access, libre access is better than free access, and libre under CC-BY or the equivalent is better than libre under more restrictive open licenses. We should achieve what we can when we can. We should not delay achieving free in order to achieve libre, and we should not stop with free when we can achieve libre.
Sarwahita is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
You are free to:
Share - copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
Adapt - remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
