Social and Emotional Wellbeing (SEW) Intervention for Mental Health Promotion Among Resettled Bhutanese Adults in Massachusetts.

Publisher: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 0005735 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1573-2789 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 00103853 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Community Ment Health J Subsets: MEDLINE

Publication: 1999- : New York, NY : Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers
Original Publication: Lexington, Mass.

Emotions* ; Mental Health*; Adult ; Bhutan ; Health Promotion ; Humans ; Massachusetts

Preventative behavioral interventions aimed at reducing mental problems among refugees are limited. We assessed the effect of a Social and Emotional Wellbeing (SEW) intervention on health-promoting behaviors (coping, social-networking, and conflict-resolution) and health-outcomes (stress, anxiety, and depression) among resettled Bhutanese adults in Western Massachusetts. The study was a community-based SEW intervention with pre-posttest evaluation among 44 Bhutanese adults in Western Massachusetts. The SEW is a culturally tailored 5-week, once-weekly health-education, problem solving, and mind-body exercise program to promote stress management skills. We used validated scales to measure outcomes. Mean scores of mental problems decreased by 5.9 for depression, 9.0 for anxiety, and 5.0 for stress post-intervention (p < 0.01). Mean scores increased by 27.3 for coping, 10.6 for social support, and 20.4 for conflict-resolution. Mean social-network scores increased by 4.6 for family, 4.7 for friends, and 1.8 for community networks (p < 0.01). Our Bhutanese participants reported improvement in their mental health after attending SEW intervention.
(© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC part of Springer Nature.)

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University Grant University of Massachusetts Amherst

Keywords: Anxiety; Depression; Emotional Wellbeing; Mindfulness; Refugees; Social Wellbeing; Stress; United States

Date Created: 20210102 Date Completed: 20210920 Latest Revision: 20210920

20240628

10.1007/s10597-020-00754-w

33387182