Alumni of Laureate Global Fellowship Asks, “How is the World Feeling?”
Lee Crockford, a 2013 Laureate Global Fellow, has taken on an ambitious project: to conduct the largest-ever, real-time mental health survey. On October 10th, 2016, Crockford’s organization will begin collecting responses from the entire world, all through an app available on any smartphone and in multiple languages.
The survey and accompanying app are called, “How is the World Feeling?” and aim to reach up to seven million people, on all seven continents, during a period of seven days, from October 10th to 16th. The app and survey are meant to start a conversation about mental health, provide app-users with personal data about their own mental health and to eventually give a set of global data about the state of mental health in a variety of regions, among diverse groups of people and in a number of social settings.
The app is available for download now here and beginning on October 10th, will prompt users to input their current mood at various points throughout their days, a step that takes only 10 seconds. The data collected for the next week will be part of the data set that the app’s creators hope will catalogue over 70 million emotions. This data could then be used by mental health organizations, businesses and governments to gauge citizens’ current mental health state and to help create more effective, targeted resources and programs.
“How is the World Feeling?” is a project from the non-profit Spur Projects which aims to tackle the rate of suicide amongst men in Australia through new approaches that give men resources, skills and language they need to take positive action for their mental health. Lee Crockford is the co-founder of Spur Projects and was selected for the Laureate Global Fellowship for his work with the group.
Spur Projects has begun a number of initiatives, all aimed at equipping people, particularly men, with tools to address mental health in innovative, healthy ways. The organization has a large presence in Australia, where it was founded, and will hope to reach internationally with their “How is the World Feeling?” project.
Crockford points out that the use of an app is a democratic way of collecting data, allowing a diverse sample of people to catalogue their emotions and contribute to a representative data set. All information collected will be available to see in real-time through the app, then to any organization or individual once the survey period ends.
To support this initiative, download the “How is the World Feeling?” app and be part of the ambitious work of gauging mental health worldwide.
