A Virtual Living Lab Platform Codeveloped for Mental Health in Youth-Onset Type 2 Diabetes (BrightSpark Care Lab): Protocol for a Mixed Methods Study (Preprint)
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a complex chronic disease that poses significant mental health challenges to affected youth. Despite calls for youth-centered research in this area, qualitative and mixed methods research is lacking, and longitudinal understandings of the mental health experiences of youth have not been generated. Living labs have potential as interactive knowledge exchange and longitudinal research platforms to generate such understandings. OBJECTIVE The proposed research aims to (1) codesign, with youth and parent coresearchers, a virtual living lab platform with an embedded registry of youth with T2D; (2) use this platform to generate longitudinal understandings of youths’ mental health experiences; (3) identify youth priorities for research and care based on the thematic data; and (4) codesign an arts-based knowledge translation (KT) resource to communicate these priorities. METHODS This study proposes a three-stage longitudinal, qualitatively dominant, convergent mixed methods design. Stage 1 involved codesigning an online platform with youth and parent coresearchers over a 4-month period and establishing a user registry of English-speaking youth (age 10-25 years) with T2D (diagnosed at age 18 years or younger) in Canada and their parents or guardians. In stage 2, up to 50 youth were purposively selected from the registry to complete baseline mental health measures, followed by 12 content modules using diary and arts-based response methods. Inductive thematic and mixed methods analysis will inform stage 3. Up to a third of the stage 3 participants will be purposively selected to identify priorities for mental health research and care and codesign arts-based KT resources to impart critical research findings to stakeholder groups identified with participants and youth coresearchers. This is an experimental modality for data collection, and participant numbers may be fewer; however, methodological insights regarding engagement will be collated and published to support digital strategy in future work. RESULTS We recruited 4 youth coresearchers to codesign the BrightSpark online platform—Canada’s first virtual living lab for youth and families with T2D—establishing an embedded registry of youth with T2D and creating the educational content of the 12 modules for the research. Recruitment and data collection began in March 2024 and concluded in September 2025. We anticipate study completion by January 2026. CONCLUSIONS Youth-onset T2D presents a significant challenge to families and health systems, with less than 30% of youth with T2D achieving treatment targets. Self-management in youth with T2D is further complicated by psychosocial morbidity, identity formation, stigma, blame, shame, historical oppression, and structural barriers to health. This study will contribute a sustainable and novel structure to understand this issue, providing opportunities to generate critically needed understandings of youths’ mental health experiences to advance family-centered research and care. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT DERR1-10.2196/83865
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.047 | 0.040 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.003 | 0.004 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.003 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.003 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.006 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.004 | 0.003 |
| Open science | 0.004 | 0.004 |
| Research integrity | 0.004 | 0.006 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.087 | 0.016 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".