Is headspace making a difference to young people’s lives?

Appendix C
noted here as contextual information that helps to explain some of the caution that we have taken in
interpreting the meaning of survey findings.
Another limitation of this study is that survey respondents do not represent a sample of the total
population of professionals in the mental health and service provision systems.
Parents and Carers Study
The Parents and Carers Study was added to the evaluation to examine the views of parents and
carers of young people with mental health, emotional and/or behavioural concerns about how the
young person they support accessed and used headspace; whether and how headspace helped
or hindered the young person; the needs of parents and carers in supporting young people; and
parents/carers own involvement with headspace. The specific research questions that the study
sought to answer were:
• What role do parents/carers play in facilitating or hindering young people’s access to and
engagement with headspace and other mental health services?
• What are parents/carers perceptions of the impact of headspace on the young person?
• How could the headspace service model be adapted to help meet the needs of parents/
carers in supporting young people?
• How do the experiences of parents and carers who had been in contact with headspace
compare with those of parents whose young people had received other mental health
services?
The Study involved two research methods:
• an online survey of parents/carers of young people with mental health concerns; and
• focus groups and telephone interviews with parents/carers.
The research methods were complementary as the focus groups were used to further examine some
of the key findings from the online survey. Each method is described below.
The online survey
The online survey was launched on the 1st of June 2014 and data collection concluded on the 30th
of September 2014. Within this time, valid responses were received from a total of 226 parents and/
or carers of young people with mental health concerns.
A number of methods were used to recruit participants to the online survey. A link to the survey was
posted on the parents and carers section of the headspace website, and on Facebook group pages
of two organisations related to youth mental healthcare in Australia (beyondblue and the Butterfly
Foundation). In addition, posters and flyers advertising the study and containing the survey URL
were sent to all headspace centres for display and distribution from reception areas. These methods
were successful in ensuring that a large number of parents and carers heard about the study – as
1,016 people clicked onto the link. However, the majority of these people did not submit a completed
survey.
The survey was designed and implemented using Key Survey, an international web-based survey
creation and management system that is supported by the University of New South Wales. The
system allows you to run standard and more complex reporting of survey items and to export survey
data. To analyse the survey, data from all complete and incomplete responses were exported to
SPSS, a statistical analysis software package, where the dataset was cleaned in preparation for
analysis. The analysis performed using SPSS was informed using an analysis plan that listed
required descriptive statistics and cross tabulations for key research questions. The results of this
analysis are presented throughout this report.
Focus group and individual interviews
Focus groups with parents and carers were held between August and October 2014, at five
headspace sites across Australia. The fieldwork sites were chosen to ensure fieldwork efficiency and
to minimise participant burden. The chosen sites are from urban and regional locations and serve
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headspace Evaluation Final Report
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