Publication date: December 2016

Overview

This review examined research on mentoring for youth (ages 18 and younger) who are experiencing mental health challenges, including those with a formal diagnosis, as established by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), those experiencing what has been defined in the literature as internalizing problems (depression, anxiety, withdrawal, and eating disorders) and/or externalizing problems (aggression, oppositional disorders, delinquency, and school problems),¹ and those who have been identified as “emotionally and/or behaviorally disturbed.”

The review focuses on four questions:

1. What is the documented effectiveness of mentoring for youth with mental health challenges (YMHC)?
2. What factors condition or shape the effectiveness of mentoring for YMHC?
3. What are the intervening processes most important in linking mentoring to outcomes for YMHC?
4. To what extent have efforts to provide mentoring to YMHC reached and engaged targeted youth, been implemented with high quality, and been adopted and sustained by host organizations and settings?

The review found a total of 25 studies addressing these questions, with the bulk of the studies focused on youth under age 12 and, in the case of formal mentoring programs, a relatively small group of programs. Although the scope of available research is limited, with mixed (i.e., inconsistent) findings complicating conclusions, the existing evidence does point toward several noteworthy possibilities:

• Beneficial effects of mentoring programs for YMHC, in particular those that have had a relatively high degree of structure, those that have been directed toward higher functioning younger children (i.e., those receiving outpatient mental health services or identified as having mental health–related challenges while still functioning in a regular school setting), and those directed toward young children and adolescents with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).
• Relatively more robust effects of mentoring program participation on mental health and academic outcomes for YMHC.
• Individual factors (e.g., severity of symptoms) and program factors (e.g., formal programs) conditioning the effect of mentoring for YMHC. Specifically, youth with more significant symptoms benefitting more from mentoring, and formal mentoring programs having a greater effect than natural mentoring.
• Reductions in the level of stress experienced by the caregiver, along with increases in the mentee’s level of trust and affect regulation, as processes or paths through which mentoring may improve outcomes for YMHC.

Available research also suggests:

• Minimal scale-up, and thus collective reach, of the programs directed toward youth with mental health challenges that have received the most rigorous evaluation.
• That mentoring programs engage and serve significant numbers of YMHC even when not targeting this population specifically.
• Interest and amenability of youth and their caregivers to involving youth in mentoring as part of mental health service provision as well as the potential for sustained engagement of YMHC in mentoring relationships that are established in this context.

To download the full PDF report, click here.