Healthcare• Illustration•Participatory Research

EASE: Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions

How might we help adolescents manage stress, anxiety, and depression while strengthening pathways to care in New York City?

Despite the growing need for adolescent mental health services in the United States (US), there remain significant barriers to care, with access to treatment especially inequitable for people of color. EASE (Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions) is a World Health Organization (WHO) intervention designed to help adolescents and their caregivers build practical emotional coping skills. For adolescents of color to engage with mental health care, they first need to recognize themselves in it. Working alongside youth, caregivers, psychologists, public health researchers, civic staff, and community-based organizations, our team co-adapted the intervention through participatory design to reflect the lived experiences, language, and identities of New York City's youth for its first implementation in the United States.

Key Outcomes

First U.S. adaptation of the World Health Organization’s EASE intervention across NYC communities [project overview]
15 community-based organizations (CBOs) are participating
51 trained facilitators reached through the program
175 adolescents and 33 caregivers are reached in 2025

Role: Illustrator and Community Engagement Facilitator

Collaborators: NYC Mayor's Office of Community Mental Health, Department of Youth and Community Development (DYCD), The New School Center for Global Mental Health, George Washington University

Duration: 1 year | 2024

Funder: New York City Mayor’s Office of Community Mental Health

Context + Challenge

Early Adolescent Skills for Emotions (EASE) is a brief, evidence-based mental health intervention for adolescents aged 10–15 experiencing emotional distress and their caregivers. Designed to be delivered by trained non-clinical community-based organization staff in trusted settings, EASE expands access to preventative mental health support where licensed providers may be limited. The intervention combines seven 90-minute after-school group sessions that build emotional regulation, coping skills, problem-solving, and supportive family communication.

Bringing EASE to New York City, however, required more than translating the curriculum. The intervention needed to feel culturally relevant and relatable for adolescents and caregivers across the city's diverse communities while preserving the evidence-based principles that make EASE effective. This meant thoughtfully adapting the stories, activities, and illustrations so participants could see their own experiences reflected in the program.

Research Process

The adaptation began with a series of participatory workshops and focus groups with adolescents and caregivers from three Brooklyn community-based organizations (CBO). The CBOs primarily serve Black, Hispanic, and Latino communities in economically marginalized neighborhoods. They recruited caregivers and adolescents from their existing services to contribute to the adaptation of a new community mental health program. The intervention was intensively workshopped through eight weekly sessions with adolescents (n = 18) and caregivers (n = 12). All participants were provided a stipend of $16 per hour for their time, as well as dinner during in-person sessions.

The conversations explored how participants interpreted the existing materials (main publication manual, adolescent and caregiver posters, caregiver handouts, the adolescent workbook, and the storybook), what felt unfamiliar, and what would help the program feel more authentic to their communities. The in-person workshops also involved the use of large poster boards, sticky notes, notebooks, and colored pencils and pens for adolescents to share their thoughts with the wider group.

Across workshops, recurring themes emerged around identity, family structures, language, neighborhoods, clothing, emotional expression, and everyday experiences. The research team synthesized these findings into adaptation priorities while ensuring the intervention's evidence-based components remained unchanged.

EASE Team conducting workshops in focus groups

Design Translation

My role centered on translating these community insights into culturally relevant illustrations that helped participants see themselves reflected throughout the intervention materials.

Classroom snapshots of clustering across interview data, heuristic evaluations, and idea prioritization matrix

These changes were highly endorsed by adolescents and caregivers during the community shareback in October 2024, with many participants sharing that the revised storyline and characters more accurately reflected their day-to-day experiences in NYC. Adolescents also expressed greater interest in this version of EASE because they could better identify with the main character’s journey of self-emotional exploration.

Results + Impact

EASE Team in action!

The study’s findings were used to inform the pilot implementation and evaluation of EASE in NYC in 2025. Making this the first U.S. adaptation of the World Health Organization’s EASE intervention across NYC communities.
15 community-based organizations (CBOs) are participating
51 trained facilitators reached through the program
175 adolescents and 33 caregivers are reached in 2025

All 11 Fall sites across Brooklyn, Harlem, and Queens have completed the full 7-session intervention cycle, demonstrating strong feasibility for implementation within NYC afterschool and youth-serving systems.
79% Youth completed the recommended EASE session threshold (>= 4 sessions)
Examining baseline, post-intervention, and 3-month follow-up assessment data for 55 youth suggested significant improvements like decrease in emotional distress and difficulty with daily functioning and an increase in school connectedness and mental well-being
EASE is being adopted in Duluth, Minnesota in partnership with Miller-Dwan Foundation’s ArcaMind Institute, making it the second city in the U.S. to implement this intervention.