Research summary
An increasing proportion of young people aged 10 to 24 years are dealing with mental health problems, such as depression and anxiety. As Canada Research Chair in Developmental Psychopathology and Youth Mental Health, Dr. Sandra Meier’s aim is to find ways to identify youth at high risk of developing mental health issues before the onset of severe symptoms.
Working with youth partners, she and her research team are co-designing and evaluating new intervention tools to boost mental health. They hope to identify altered patterns in the daily behaviours of youth with mental disorders to determine whether these behaviours can predict the risks and trajectories of mental disorders, including treatment response. Ultimately, Meier and her team will develop personalized, preventive and therapeutic strategies based on the patterns of daily life behaviours they identify.