Het effect van tewerkstelling op de mentale gezondheid van jonge sociaal kwetsbare bevolkingsgroepen in het Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest

It is well known that the mental health of unemployed people is worse than the mental health of their employed contemporaries. We also know that vulnerable groups in society tend to accumulate characteristics with a negative health impact. Certainly, work and employment are important in that respect. At the same time, we are facing high unemployment rates of (vulnerable) young people living in the Brussels Region.

This research focuses on unemployment and active labour market policies as social determinants of mental health in young people. This will be done by focussing on the perspective of low-educated youth. A longitudinal qualitative and quantitative research design will be used, in order to assess the complex relations between unemployment, (re-)employment through activation methods and mental health in the population under study. This design will also allow us to evaluate the mental health impact of different types of activation policies and trajectories.

For the quantitative part of the research, 750 respondents will be asked to fill in a standardised questionnaire during 3 waves. All of the respondents will be unemployed during the first wave of the questionnaire. This survey will contain questions concerning mental health using the MHI-5 and the GHQ-12. Adding questions concerning the quality of work during the second and third waves enables us to look at the influence of the quality of work on the mental health foofr those who are working.

The qualitative part of the research design consists of 30 narrative in-depth interviews during 2 waves. These interviews will focus on the latent functions of labour of which we know that they - as social stressors - have an important influence on mental health. These results will provide more insight regarding the impact of (un)employment on the mental health of low-educated youth and on the consequences of different trajectories on their mental health. Consequently, different organisations working with and around the topic of youth unemployment and welfare in the Brussels Region will be able to valorise the results of this research.