What gets
in the way?
Understanding the barriers between needing support and feeling able to seek it.
Research
Better questions.
More understanding.
Behind every question about mental health
are people living with the answer.
Explore our reports on the barriers to care, the meaning of connection, and the ways people find and offer support.
Project Semicolon
Research
Research
Featured report · Access to care
Why didn’t you
reach out?
A lived experience study on barriers to mental health care.
Read the reportThe report library
Look closer at
what people experience.
Explore a subject that matters to you. Each report links to its full discussion, methods, and findings.
Access & support · Barriers to care
“Why Didn’t You
Reach Out?”
What can make asking for help feel difficult, out of reach, or unsafe? Explore the experiences behind the hesitation.
Read the reportAccess & support · Peer connection
“You Helped Me
Hold On”
How do people experience support from peers and communities? A closer look at connection beyond formal care settings.
Read the reportStories & symbols · Personal storytelling
“Sharing Saved Me”
What does telling a mental health story mean to the person sharing it? Explore motivations, concerns, and experiences of being heard.
Read the reportStories & symbols · Personal meaning
“This Mark Means
I Stayed”
How do people give meaning to tattoos, creative expression, and shared rituals? Explore symbolism in their accounts of recovery.
Read the reportDigital spaces · Gaming & connection
“You Were There When
No One Else Was”
What happens when a mental health message enters a gaming community? Explore players’ experiences of recognition and connection.
Read the reportDigital spaces · Safety planning
“When I Didn’t Trust My Mind,
I Trusted the Plan”
How do people use digital safety plans, and what do they find useful? Explore reported experiences of planning and returning to support.
Read the reportThese are Project Semicolon reports. Read each report’s methods and limitations alongside its findings.
The questions behind the work
Understanding should
lead somewhere useful.
These subjects connect to practical questions about how people find support, feel understood, and take a next step.
What gets
What helps people
feel understood?
Exploring the role of shared experiences, communities, and the language people use.
Where can support
meet people?
Looking at the places, symbols, and tools that become part of someone’s life.
Make room for the full picture
Read with curiosity.
Keep the context.
A finding is most useful when it stays connected to how it was gathered and what it can tell us. These questions can help as you read.
Whose experiences are represented?
Look at who contributed, how participants were recruited, and which voices may be missing. The experiences described belong in that context.
How was the information gathered?
Read the methods as well as the findings. A personal account, a survey response, and a measured outcome offer different kinds of information.
What do the findings support?
Consider the report’s limitations before drawing a wider conclusion. A meaningful personal experience does not, by itself, establish cause and effect or predict another person’s experience.
Keep the conversation going
A question
worth asking?
Have a question about a report, an idea to explore, or an interest in a research conversation? Tell us a little about it.