Mental Health: An intersectional approach

This is a 45 minute taster webinar looking at mental health through an intersectional lens.

Everyone’s identity and life experiences are different. It seems obvious that we should consider the intersectionality of these identities when we approach mental health. Sometimes we are not even considering any of them. People’s different experiences create different challenges for our mental health and also mean different interventions are successful or otherwise.

A young, gay male graduate, whose sexuality has not been accepted by his family, will have entirely different mental health challenges from a middle manager coming back from extended leave due to baby loss. Each of these situations needs an individualised approach.

This webinar is a taster of the research that we have put together on this subject, looking at what we know about how aspects of our identities intersect and impact our mental health.  Given the wealth of data pointing to just how much our mental health is impacted by our identity, we make the case for a more intersectional approach to mental health interventions.

The aim of this is to help you to:

• Understand why it makes sense to look at mental health through an intersectional lens
• Learn how mental health problems show up differently in the workplace and beyond for different identity markers and what unique barriers might be in the way when several markers intersect
• Come away with tips for approaching colleagues about mental health which respects all aspects of their identity and how they intersect