Interventions, practices and institutional arrangements for supporting PGR mental health and wellbeing: reviewing effectiveness and addressing barriers

A significant, if relatively small, body of literature provides a picture of PGR mental health and wellbeing, and key factors influencing this. However, little has been written on interventions, practices and changes to institutional support for PGRs, how these impact on wellbeing, and what factors influence their success. This paper summarises and synthesises research that has evaluated interventions or institutional changes aimed at supporting PGR mental health and wellbeing. A rapid systematic review methodology identified 21 papers, which evaluated interventions or practices to support PGR wellbeing, gathering data from 1066 students, 33 staff members (mainly supervisors) and 11 recent graduates. The papers included were diverse but limited and therefore did not offer strong evidence for the effectiveness of specific approaches. However, they provided valuable insight, which we conceptualise in a model of approaches to enhancing PGR wellbeing before exploring barriers to implementation of interventions, and recommendations for research, policy and practice.