Drama and gaming are being used in a pair of projects exploring adolescent mental health. Dr Daisy Fancourt finds out why this meeting of the arts and science might unlock new ideas for treatments and discovers the different ways in which young people are participating in the projects.

Professor Eunice Ma is the Provost of Falmouth University and is co-leading a new project called ATTUNE. This will look at the way adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can affect adolescents' mental health with the aim of developing new approaches to prevention and care.
Edmund Sonuga-Barke is Professor of Developmental Psychology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience at King’s College London and is leading a new project called RE-STAR which aims to help young people with neuroatypicalities such as Attention Deficit/Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).

You can find information about the projects on this link https://www.ukri.org/news/24-million-investment-into-adolescent-mental-health/

The podcast is made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UKRI. You can find a playlist called New Research on the website for Radio 3's Free Thinking programme and all the episodes are available as Arts & Ideas podcasts.

Producer: Phoebe McFarlane