In Their Own Words: Ontario Youth on Wellbeing, Barriers, and Transforming Mental Health Care

Introduction: Young people’s mental health is an increasing focus of global research and policy, raising urgent questions about how youth understand wellbeing and what is needed to build responsive mental health and addictions (MHA) systems in contexts shaped by uncertainty, inequity, and rapid social change. Intersecting disruptions, including the COVID-19 pandemic, have reshaped the social, educational, and community contexts of youth’s lives. These disruptions have intensified inequities and exposed gaps in current approaches to youth wellbeing. This highlights the need for social work research to document disparities and center youth perspectives in shaping equitable policy and systems of care.

Objective: The voices and lived experiences of young people remain underrepresented in mental health research. This study responds to that gap by centering youth as experts in their own lives, drawing on a critical youth studies framework that foregrounds the importance of recording youth stories during a pivotal moment in world history.

Methods: This study draws on data from the Ontario Youth Sector Compass project, a mixed-methods study conducted by Youth Research and Evaluation eXchange (YouthREX) in collaboration with the York Research Chair in Youth and Contexts of Inequity. The project was designed to capture Ontario youth voices and illuminate the state of youth work across Ontario. Data were collected in late Fall 2021 through early Winter 2022, during the Omicron wave of the COVID-19 virus. Using reflexive thematic analysis of open-ended survey responses (n=3,343) and semi-structured interviews (n=82) with youth aged 15–29 from across Ontario, we examined how young people narrated their wellbeing, the barriers they faced, and what they identified as meaningful sources of support.

Results: Our analyses revealed five interconnected themes. First, youth described a range of individual concerns shaped by the pandemic, including stress, loneliness, a pervasive sense of "missing out" on formative life experiences and uncertainty about their futures. Second, youth spoke to the profound impact of disrupted social connection, from family and friends to peer networks and community spaces, as a central driver of diminished wellbeing. Third, structural inequities emerged as significant and compounding barriers to belonging and mental health, including experiences of racism, transphobia, housing instability, involvement with child welfare and justice systems, and youth employment precarity in the province. Fourth, youth described diverse experiences with professional MHA care, ranging from positive, trusting relationships with providers to harmful or alienating encounters that eroded confidence in formal systems. Fifth, youth articulated clear priorities for a more responsive MHA system, including culturally sensitive care, community-based and geographically accessible services, and supports that go beyond drop-in models toward sustained, relationship-based approaches.

Conclusion: These findings highlight that wellbeing cannot be understood apart from the broader social conditions shaping young people's lives. Ontario youth hold expansive, holistic understandings of wellbeing and offer actionable pathways toward more responsive and inclusive MHA care that extend beyond what traditional MHA systems offer. In this presentation we will argue that short-term navigational fixes are insufficient. Instead, sustained systemic investment is urgently needed to meet the diverse needs of youth and strengthen collective wellbeing.