Popular YouTubers open up for teen-focused mental health video series

(TNND) — Youth mental health experts are teaming with popular YouTube content creators to give teens the tools to deal with common emotional struggles.

The Jed Foundation (JED), an organization focused on mental health for teens and young adults, and creative studio Room 1041 are producing 40 videos in their "Mind Matters" series on YouTube.

Several topics have already been tackled, and more full-length videos and Shorts will roll out in the coming weeks.

Nine in 10 teens use YouTube, and JED says nearly 90% of teens go online for mental health information.

“It's really important to meet young people where they are,” said youth mental health expert Katie Hurley.

Hurley, a licensed clinical social worker and the senior director of clinical advising and community programs at JED, said they recruited a diverse group of content creators to talk about teen concerns such as anxiety, depression, eating disorders and stress management.

In one video, YouTubers NEVADA and Gavin Magnus, who both have over 7 million subscribers, talk about breakups.

Four content creators – GloZell, Symonne Harrison, zoeunlimited and Rosanna Pansino – talk about loneliness in another video.

Ashley Yi, who has over 3 million YouTube subscribers, talks about managing anger in another video.

Yi told a JED expert in the video that anger as a child made her feel “hopeless, lonely, like you just have no one to talk to. You kind of just are in your head and it just goes to a dark place.”

And her top advice for teens when they get angry is to pause, collect themselves, and don’t immediately react.

Take a few breaths, take a walk, hug a pet, or drink a cool glass of water, she said.

“Something to get your mind off of it for a few minutes, because it will pass,” Yi said.

Hurley said these famous content creators can show teens they’re not alone in their feelings.

“We really wanted to leverage the power of creators, because young people look to these creators. They look up to them. They feel like they can trust them. They feel like they have this relationship built over a long time of following them,” Hurley said. “And so, this is really a way for them to see that even these people ... struggle with things. And they can talk openly about it. If they can talk about it, it normalizes the conversations around mental health.”

JED produced a similar YouTube series featuring conversations about mental health with top athletes.

Hurley said JED worked with YouTube to base the topics for this video series on search data.

“We want to give them those tools that they're searching for,” Hurley said.