Shifting beliefs about suicide: Pre-post evaluation of the effectiveness of a program for workers in the construction industry

Abstract

Suicide is a significant health problem that is known to disproportionately affect those employed in manual occupations, including construction workers and tradespeople. Universal General Awareness Training (GAT) was part of a multi-component suicide prevention program in the Australian construction industry. The program’s aims were to increase awareness of mental health and suicide, reduce stigma, and encourage help-seeking and help-offering behaviours. This paper sought to examine the effectiveness of the GAT program in shifting suicide beliefs. Pre-and post-training survey data of 20,125 respondents was obtained from a database of GAT evaluation results between 2016 and 2018. Generalized ..