Investigating mental health and coping with daily self-help apps 

The first project-based study, E-health: coping during the Covid-19 pandemic with daily self-help apps, (01.2020-01.2021) aimed to investigate whether using one of two self-help apps could support students with their mental health during the restrictions and isolation due to Covid-19. We also mapped students' experiences of psychological problems, concerns related to Covid-19, and experience of support in their vicinity. 116 students were recruited as participants and one master's student as a co-researcher. We introduced the students to daily self-help with one of the two self-help apps MCT & More App and SMART, both of which are based on cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). Our hypothesis was that the self-help apps would help to reduce depressive symptoms, provide increased self-confidence and a higher quality of life among students at a time of greatly reduced social life and absent campus life. The students participated in the study for more than a year. They answered online questionnaires about how they experienced the effect of the app, based on whether they used it, experienced it as a support and why they did not use it. The co-researcher, who was a master's student in public health, participated in the work from idea to dissemination. They used parts of the data in their own master's thesis and were a co-author of a feasibility article where we summarized our experiences with the study. We are still analyzing data for future publications. The student has completed their master's degree but is still involved in the project and wishes to remain so until publication. This project-based survey group consists of researchers from the Department of Psychology, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and from the Department of Community Medicine. 

Multidisciplinary collaboration in the espresso-coffee pilot 

For the second project-based study, the espresso-coffee pilot, (2021-2022), we collaborated with a multidisciplinary team of teachers, medicine students, and students from bachelor’s programmes in bioengineering and nutrition. The study was designed by teachers on the three study programmes, a medical student at master's level as a co-researcher, PhD students, and researchers and teachers from the project group.  

We wanted to incorporate the espresso-coffee study into relevant teaching activities of the three different educational programmes. The students were to learn about research through planning the survey and collecting data, and gain experience working in multidisciplinary teams. Students from other study programmes were recruited as participants. The data collection was carried out once a week for 10 weeks, in autumn 2021, by the bioengineering students, the nutrition students and the medical students. The bioengineering students collected blood samples from the participants, the nutrition students received the student participants' self-report of their daily diet, while the medical students measured blood pressure, weight, and height. PhD students in epidemiology at ISM contributed with planning, implementation, and statistical analysis. We wanted to investigate the effect of espresso consumption on total cholesterol in the blood, HDL, LDL cholesterol, in young healthy adults. Few intervention studies have investigated the effect of espresso consumption on the lipid profile (total cholesterol, HDL, LDL cholesterol). Five students have used data from the espresso-survey in their own bachelor’s thesis, including two bioengineering students who have evaluated their own learning, the espresso study's organization, and implementation into teaching. We will publish a feasibility article about the espresso-coffee study.  

We will use our experience and insights from these project-based studies (pilots) when we develop the well-being survey and future project-based studies, preferably incorporating research projects and learning outcomes in collaboration with study programmes and UiT-students.