Principles and Practice of Social Marketing: Case study: the Act–Belong–Commit campaign promoting positive mental health
The Act–Belong–Commit community-based social marketing campaign targets individuals to engage in activities that enhance mental health. It simultaneously encourages community organisations offering such activities to promote their activities under the Act–Belong–Commit banner. The campaign provides a simple framework for mental health promotion professionals to communicate with, and gain the co-operation of, potential partners and stakeholders within and outside the health system. The campaign was developed as an upstream or primary prevention intervention. However, the campaign messages are also appropriate for at-risk individuals and groups (secondary prevention), and for people recovering from a mental illness (tertiary prevention). Hence, as it evolves the campaign is developing a number of programme components and partners for secondary and tertiary prevention. The campaign is conducted by Mentally Healthy WA, a group based within the Faculty of Health Sciences at Curtin University in Western Australia (WA). This chapter draws on a number of publications available from the website (e.g., Donovan, James and Jalleh 2007; Donovan et al . 2003a, 2006a; Jalleh et al . 2007).
Implementing Mental Health Promotion: The Act–Belong–Commit Mentally Healthy WA Campaign in Western Australia
Mental health promotion is attracting attention as health authorities become increasingly concerned with the rise in mental illnesses. However, there is little to guide health professionals in communicating to individuals and community groups what mental health promotion – in the sense of strengthening people's mental health and mental illness prevention – is about, or to guide population-wide interventions. The Act–Belong–Commit Mentally Healthy WA campaign provides a simple framework to assist mental health promotion professionals communicate with and gain the co-operation of potential partners and stakeholders for mental health promotion programs. The campaign is based on the results of focus group research on community members' perceptions of what mental health is, and concepts of positive mental health as described by psychologists and others in the literature. Two frameworks were developed: one for targeting individuals to be proactive about their own mental health, and one targeting people in authority to be mindful about the way they deal with those in their care. The frameworks are presented as ABCs to provide a simple mnemonic of relevant concepts. The Act–Belong–Commit component described here was developed to target individuals to be proactive about their own mental health and well-being.
Implications of Evidence-Based Practice for Community Health
Evidence-based practice, developed in clinical medicine, is being applied to community health programs. Barriers to implementation of evidence-based practice noted in clinical medicine are likely to exist in community health settings and may be complicated by the nature of community health programs. These barriers include accessibility and availability of relevant data, social and political considerations of program decision-making, and conflicting expectations for evaluation research. This paper discusses barriers to both amassing evidence for practice and using evidence for decision-making in community health. The potential for conflict between practice goals set by evidence-based thinking and those set by community health organizations is also discussed. Implications for evaluations of community health programs are raised and recommendations for improving access to and use of evaluation information are made.