Good work for young people’s mental health: Evaluating the impact of individual placement support on young people’s mental health and employment outcomes

Home > Research > Good work for young people’s mental health: Evaluating the impact of individual placement support on young people’s mental health and employment outcomes

Research Team: Dr Daniele Carrieri, Prof Katrina Wyatt, Prof G.J. Melendez-Torres, Kath Wilkinson, Dr Eleanor Winpenny, Dr Steven Hope, Prof Dougal Hargreaves, Dr Charlotte Gredal, Alena Oxenham, Dr Hannah Fairbrother, Dr Nick Woodrow

Who's involved: Researchers from the University of Exeter, Imperial College London, and the University of Sheffield. The People’s Health Trust 42nd Street, Manchester Mancroft Advice Project (MAP) Norwich No Limits, Southampton

April 2025 – September 2027

What does this mean for public health professionals?

Young people who are not in education, employment or training (NEET) are more likely to experience poor mental health. In turn, experiencing poor mental health increases the likelihood of young people being NEET. This two-way relationship creates significant challenges for services supporting young people. Although good-quality employment can play a key role in supporting young people’s mental wellbeing, services often find it difficult to know when and how to best intervene in this complex cycle.

This project will offer valuable insights into addressing the critical link between youth unemployment and mental health. It will provide evidence around the use of a personalised approach to helping people into work, called Individual Placement and Support (IPS), for young people with mild-to-moderate mental health challenges. By looking at how IPS could be integrated into existing services supporting young people’s mental health, the research will provide practical quantitative and qualitative evidence on IPS in a UK context.

The research will contribute to helping policy makers and youth organisations understand how IPS could be used and integrated to best meet the needs of diverse young people, improving both their employment outcomes and mental health.

What does this mean for the public?

This project aims to generate vital evidence to address the growing concern around the number of young people not in education, employment, or training (NEET), and the well-established links between this and poor mental health. The research seeks to understand how best to support these young people, particularly those facing mental health challenges, to find and retain meaningful employment. It focuses on how Individual Placement and Support (IPS) can be used in services that help young people with mental health challenges to find employment. IPS uses personalised support to help young people find employment that aligns with their interests, skills and wellbeing needs.

By identifying what works in supporting young people into employment, this project has the potential to strengthen support systems, boost local economies, and contribute to healthier communities. Ultimately, it could help reduce the long-term impacts of unemployment and mental ill-health for many young people.

Background

Current estimates suggest that one in every eight young people aged 16–24 years in the UK are not in education, employment or training (NEET). Experiencing poor mental health increases the likelihood of young people being NEET, and being NEET, in turn, can worsen mental health. Conversely, good-quality employment supports young people’s mental health and wellbeing. The People’s Health Trust, a national charity working to reduce inequalities, has started a programme, Good Work for Young People’s Mental Health, aimed at supporting young people with mental health issues to secure and retain good quality work.

The People’s Health Trust are funding three partner organisations, based in Greater Manchester, Norwich and Southampton, to deliver the Good Work for Young People’s Mental Health programme. Each organisation will be funded to provide variations of Individual Placement Support (IPS). IPS is a ‘wraparound’ approach that supports young people into employment and also supports them once in work.

Aims

Our overarching aims are:

a) To understand how IPS can be integrated into organisations supporting young people facing mental health challenges across different contexts

b) To understand the impacts of this programme on young people’s employment and mental health outcomes, as well as its broader impacts on their communities.

Data and methods

The project is taking a mixed methods approach.

Quantitative data analysis: The research team will collaborate with the People’s Health Trust to establish a core set of outcomes to be tracked across all supported individuals at participating organisations, including individual contact points, sociodemographic information, and mental health and employment outcomes collected at regular intervals. Data will be compared to those eligible who did not enter the programme (as available), as well as data on matched populations from longitudinal cohorts. Further, we will conduct an economic evaluation of the IPS delivery model costing its delivery, and will explore the application of a cost-consequence model to estimate economic outcomes.

Qualitative data analysis: This project will gather qualitative data using a three-phase approach: initial consultations with stakeholders to develop a theory of how IPS could impact mental health and employment, and to understand the context across the sites; in-depth interviews with implementing organisations, young people receiving IPS, delivery staff, commissioners, and employers to explore expectations, local context, and perspectives on the program’s acceptability, feasibility, and effectiveness; and finally, close-out focus groups with implementing organisations to reflect on their experiences and lessons learned.

Stakeholder and public involvement

A project advisory group (PAG), comprising academic experts, employers, mental health services, and policymakers, will be established and engaged throughout the evaluation. This group will provide guidance and input at strategic points, ensuring a range of perspectives inform the research process and its findings through regular meetings, and workshops.

We will also set up a young person project advisory group (YP PAG). The YP PAG will also provide guidance and input at strategic points (e.g., in the design of data collection tools) to support the project. Members from the YP PAG will be invited to attend the wider PAG to ensure representation.

Dissemination

The project’s dissemination plans and outputs, including content and format, will be informed by ongoing engagement and involvement with the project’s stakeholders (including People’s Health Trust, the PAG and YP PAG). The project will culminate in a workshop to share findings with policy and practice stakeholders. This will be accompanied with a report/briefing paper which covers key findings from the project. It is anticipated that other outputs will include creative outputs and academic publications.