Teoría del Trabajo Doméstico no renumerado

Following written approval from the Sydney University’s Human Ethics Committee (see Appendix C), schools were approached to give permission for students and teachers to participate. Of the three schools selected for inclusion, all agreed to participate, but the girls school withdrew early in the programme development due to

administration changes at the school. The programme was, therefore, conducted in the two other schools. The selected schools were then allocated as either the control or intervention school, with the programme, if effective, being offered to the control school after the current research completion.

The mental health and wellbeing programme was developed and implemented with ongoing input from the school principal, deputy principal, pastoral care coordinator, teachers, the school counsellor and students from the intervention school. The programme was delivered to the whole Year 7 cohort using a whole-school approach.

Hence, all boys in Year 7 were included in the school-based programme, but their parents were able to withdraw them from the research component of the study if they did not want them to participate. Signed, informed consent was requested of the parents and students, and it was explained that participation was voluntary. Students were also informed that they may withdraw at any time or choose not to answer particular questions in the questionnaire should they wish not to. Prior to completion of the questionnaire, the researcher explained the purpose of the study to the students and they were given the opportunity to ask any questions or raise any concerns they may have had. The questionnaire was completed at a time and place convenient to the participants and the school schedule.

The pencil and paper questionnaire took approximately 25 to 30 minutes for the students to complete at a time convenient for each school. In each school, the researcher and a member of staff took responsibility for coordinating the completion of the questionnaires by participants (typically the head of year of pastoral care coordinator). Administration of the questionnaires took place in either whole-year (e.g., year assemblies) or whole-class (e.g., tutor) groups, whereby participants were sitting at a table by themselves. Each questionnaire was administered by the researcher, in person. This was expected to dramatically increase retention rates and reduce the inconvenience to the participant and the school. The project and questionnaire was explained to participants and they were given an opportunity to ask questions or comment on the study. Any participant who had difficulties in completing the questionnaires (e.g., because of poor literacy) were able to solicit support from the researcher or an appropriate member of staff. If questions were not completed or inappropriately answered, the researcher and school staff member

returned the questionnaire to the participant with further instructions. This was also expected to increase response rates for each question.

Tracking of individual responses over time was achieved through the use of personalised unique numerical identifier. This information was used solely for accurate matching and was used to keep the identity of participants confidential and anonymous. Once completed, the questionnaires were scored and input the data into an electronic database. Random quality checks were performed (e.g., comparison of hard and electronic copy data for the same student) to ensure accuracy of scoring.

Survey data from all participants in participating schools were collected at the beginning of 2010 (Time 1 [T1] baseline), immediately preceding the mental health and wellbeing intervention, six months after the start of the intervention (Time 2 [T2]

post-intervention) and 10 months after post-intervention (Time 3 [T3] follow-up).

Intervention males at high risk of mental health issues were identified according to the protocol of O’Dea (2009), using the questionnaire Physical Appearance Score subscale and liaison with the school counsellor and pastoral care coordinators.

Ongoing school counsellor and pastoral care coordinator support, and clinical assessment and referrals for high-risk students by the school counsellor were utilised as part of the whole-school approach in collaboration with the mental health and wellbeing intervention.

4.3.3.1 Sample

It was not possible to randomly allocate schools to the mental health and wellbeing programme and comparison school because schools were already recruited. Attrition during the study meant that the final sample consisted of 146 (91.25%) and 39 (90.70%) students in the intervention and control schools respectively. The overall attrition for adolescents in both schools from baseline to follow-up was 8.87%.

Student attrition was due to students and their families moving schools, moving interstate or being relocated overseas. Due to the nature of recruitment of the programme an a priori retention rate of 80% was considered appropriate for the intervention and control groups. As a broad indication, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence systematic review quality criteria for attrition rates in

evaluation research suggests that studies with an attrition rate less than 30% are effective (Adi, Schrader-McMillan, Kiloran & Stewart-Brown, 2007). In this regard the rate of attrition at the school level was considered acceptable.

4.3.3.2 Participants

The study included students from Year 7 from three high schools in the Illawarra region of NSW, Australia. Students starting Year 7 in the 2010 school year were the target cohort for this evaluation. All students were aged 11 to 13 years at baseline, with the control and intervention group having a mean age of 12.55 (Standard Deviation [SD]=0.35) and 12.42 (SD=0.40) respectively. Female students recorded a mean age of 12.47 (SD=0.35) and came from school one and two. These cases provide sufficient data for quantitative analyses. Of the 203 students in the intervention (n=160, school 3) and control groups (n=43, school 2) who filled out the questionnaire at T1, 189 (93.1%) also participated at T2 (n=153, 95.63%; n=36, 83.72%), and 185 (91.1%) participated at T3 (n=146, 91.25%; n=39, 90.70%). The final intervention group at T1 consisted of 160 male students with the control group consisting of 43 male students. The final number of students varied across the different outcome measures based on differential response rates, missing data and whether a protocol for data imputation existed for the measure in question. The flow chart for recruitment, attrition and organisation of the programme is shown in Figure 3 on the following page. An independent t-test was conducted to see whether the groups differed at baseline. Results showed that there was no significant difference between groups in age (t(200)=1.61, p=.06).

The majority of the participant sample were of Caucasian/Northern European background for both the intervention (52.8%, n=84) and control school (65.0%, n=26). The majority of the female participants also described their ethnicity/cultural background as Caucasian/Northern European (55.7%, n=107). Total participation and demographic information specific to both the participating intervention and control schools are provided in Chapter 5.

Figure 3 Participant flow for the mental health and wellbeing promotion intervention.

Follow-up measurements (n=146) Follow-up measurements (n=39)

Analysis conducted (n=146) Analysis conducted (n=39)

Evaluation (n=123)