From Small Ripples to a Sea Change: Elucidating Long-Term and Multi-Level Youth Mental Health Intervention Impacts Using Ripple Effects Mapping

Ripple effects mapping (REM), a qualitative participatory approach to intervention evaluation, is gaining recognition as a useful method for elucidating the long-term intended and unintended impacts of complex public health interventions. The present study applied an adapted REM approach to capture systems and community change associated with the Agenda Gap program. This population-level youth mental health promotion intervention is embedded in multi-sectoral partnerships with long-term and relational outcomes post-program that are difficult to elucidate using traditional program evaluation methods. Using transcript and mind map data generated through an REM process with former Agenda Gap youth collaborators and adult allies, reflexive thematic analysis supported the construction of three thematic program outcomes: (1) Reimagining Future Possibilities, (2) Systems Integration: Transforming School Practices, and (3) Progressing From Ripple Effects to Sea Change. Spanning socioecological levels (i.e., individual, family, community, and societal), the outcomes and their associated sub-themes captured the meaningful impacts experienced by Agenda Gap participants, as well as those more distal to the intervention, in the years following implementation. These findings demonstrate the substantive, multi-level impacts of the program and also illustrate how qualitative, participatory approaches, such as REM, can complement other forms of evaluation to reveal outcomes that are typically overlooked. Recommendations and implications for future research and applications of REM are offered.