Self-harm signals intense psychological distress and is the strongest predictor of death by suicide, which in turn is the second most common cause of death in young people.
We invited young people to consider how the Card Sort Task for Self-Harm (Townsend et al 2016) might be developed for other issues (for example eating disorders) or delivered in alternative formats (such as online).
Young people with lived experience helped us (supported by Harmless, a user-led support service) shape a modified, online version of the CaTS and led a spoken-word event in the Nottingham Contemporary Art Gallery café which showcased and reflected on the findings of our work together.
This work led to a student project which evaluated the online CaTS which was published in an international peer reviewed journal (Lockwood et al, 2023).