Good Arts, Good Mental Health ® : The effectiveness of an Australian health promotion media campaign in promoting community mental wellbeing via the arts

Christina R Davies^1*Melanie T Pescud¹Rhonda Clifford²Richard McGrath³Annie Thomson¹Mia Jeffrey¹Melissa Stoneham⁴Terri Pikora¹Peter Wright⁵Sonya Girdler⁶Loretta Baldassar⁷Stephen Clift⁸

• ¹Centre for Arts, Mental Health and Wellbeing WA. School of Allied Health & School of Humanities, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, Western Australia, Australia
• ²School of Allied Health, University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia
• ³UniSA Allied Health and Human Performance, University of South Australia, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
• ⁴Public Health Advocacy Institute, Curtin University, Bentley, Australia
• ⁵School of Education, College of Health and Education. Murdoch University, Murdoch, Australia
• ⁶Centre of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, School of Allied Health, Curtin University, Bentley, Australia
• ⁷School of Arts and Humanities, Edith Cowan University, Joondalup, Western Australia, Australia
• ⁸Sidney De Haan Research Centre for Arts and Health, Canterbury Christ Church University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom

Introduction: This paper describes and evaluates Good Arts, Good Mental Health® (GAGMH), a groundbreaking, population-level, arts-mental health promotion media campaign. The objectives of the campaign (Wave 1) were to increase brand awareness, comprehension, and agreement with the tagline Good Arts, Good Mental Health®, and empower the general population to form an intention to engage in the Arts for their mental wellbeing.Methods: The campaign ran from August to September 2024 (4-weeks), cost AUD$198,965 (23% creative, 77% media/advertising distribution), and targeted the Western Australian (WA) general population aged 18-65 years, all genders, metropolitan and regional areas. The campaign was distributed through a variety of platforms, channels, visual, audio, and static assets. To gauge the success of the campaign, a process evaluation and (short-term) outcome evaluation were conducted by sourcing online analytics and conducting an online survey of the campaign target group (n=661).Results: Overall, campaign reach and frequency were optimal and met set targets. Campaign website engagement substantially increased from baseline (7505 to 53,810 events one-month after the campaign). Advertising cost-per-reach was effective and ranged from $0 for free/organic media to $0.10 for radio. For paid media channels, the highest reach (948,106 people) and best cost-per-reach ($0.02) was delivered by Meta (Facebook, Instagram).Measured as both (1) a proportion of total respondents, and (2) as a sub-set analysis of each preceding level in the cognitive impact hierarchy, post-campaign, one-in-four respondents were aware of Good Arts, Good Mental Health®. This is comparatively high for a new tagline and health campaign without TV advertising. Overall, comprehension was satisfactory. Agreement and intention to act on the message were high, and double that of comparison WA health promotion campaigns.Discussion: Study findings indicate the GAGMH campaign was successful. If funded, future waves of the campaign could build on Wave 1 to reinforce message awareness, increase understanding of GAGMH concepts, focus more on the arts-mental health dose, and extend the outcome evaluation by measuring behavioural action. The information contained in this paper is useful to Public Health, Mental Health and Arts-Health professionals in the planning, implementation, and evaluation of future arts-mental health promotion strategies and campaigns.