Transitions to Belonging: Evaluating the Impacts of a Community-Based Physical Activity Program Through the Lens of Newcomer Youths’ Definitions of Mental Health

The immigrant population in Canada is rapidly increasing and projected to rise exponentially in the coming years. The immigrant population faces complex and diverse challenges when transitioning into a new country, and this occurrence may be uniquely experienced by youth, who are also navigating transitions in child development, most notably into adolescence. Embedded in a broader mixed-methods pilot project, the aim of this thesis was to qualitatively investigate the impact of the Immigrant-based Physical Literacy for Youth (IPLAY) program on mental health and well-being. Twenty-one Afghan youth were interviewed, eleven who participated in the fall offering of the program (Mage = 15 ± 3; nmales=7), and ten who participated in the winter offering (Mage = 15.8 ± 1.8; nmales=5). Results indicated that youth held a holistic conceptualization of mental health, contrasting what is common practice in the field and literature. This holistic conceptualization had youth perceiving mental health as a dichotomy, recognizing the connection between physical and mental health, and sometimes including descriptions of soul. Mental health was also often connected to the youth’s own experience as a newcomer, discussing newfound feelings of safety, the life left behind, the role of adjustment, and new opportunities and future-oriented thinking. Participation in the IPLAY program seemed to affect mental health and well-being outcomes for the youth, including the opportunity to reconnect, expand social connections, experience a general source of enjoyment, and retreat from home and usual responsibilities. Beyond individual well-being outcomes, the program also seemed to serve as a vehicle for broader integration, by encouraging gender interactions, creating a multicultural environment, and bolstering the youths’ motivation and confidence to engage in new activities. Such findings provide a rich tapestry of understanding into how newcomer youth define, understand, and experience mental health, and may have important policy implications to shift understanding of transition stress from migration beyond just the initial arrival. The results also indicate that programs such as IPLAY can have important and positive impacts on youth participants, and how future programming may be able to adapt to further support the growing demographic of newcomer youth