# What Youth Write About and Seek in an Anonymized Online Peer Support Forum: Insights from India

## TL;DR

Indian youth use an anonymous online forum to share personal and mental health concerns, seeking peer support and validation.

## Contribution

This study identifies the types of concerns and purposes behind youth participation in anonymized online peer support forums in India.

## Key findings

- Youth posts covered personal, relational, social, and achievement-related concerns with frequent emotional disclosures.
- Key purposes for posting included venting distress, seeking peer suggestions, and seeking validation.
- Mental health concerns like depression and social anxiety were mentioned, often without professional help-seeking suggestions.

## Abstract

Public health relevance—How does this work relate to a public health issue?
High prevalence of psychological distress in youth, combined with preference for self-reliance and informal support and inclination towards digital platforms, highlights the potential of anonymized online peer support forums as one of the accessible avenues for supporting youth mental health.

High prevalence of psychological distress in youth, combined with preference for self-reliance and informal support and inclination towards digital platforms, highlights the potential of anonymized online peer support forums as one of the accessible avenues for supporting youth mental health.

Public health significance—Why is this work of significance to public health?
Youth posts on the forum reflected diverse personal, relational, social, and achievement-related concerns, often accompanied by intense negative emotional disclosures.Venting distress, seeking peer suggestions, sharing perspectives, meaning-making, and seeking validation emerged as the key purposes of posting on the forum. These findings underscore the scope and utility of such forums.

Youth posts on the forum reflected diverse personal, relational, social, and achievement-related concerns, often accompanied by intense negative emotional disclosures.

Venting distress, seeking peer suggestions, sharing perspectives, meaning-making, and seeking validation emerged as the key purposes of posting on the forum. These findings underscore the scope and utility of such forums.

Public health implications—What are the key implications or messages for practitioners, policy makers and/or researchers in public health?
Such anonymous, moderated forums can offer accessible, low-intensity support for youth in distress. It can be integrated into mental health promotion activities to deliver high-quality, responsive care.Future studies should examine how such platforms can foster professional help-seeking when needed, leveraging peer norms and behavioral nudges.

Such anonymous, moderated forums can offer accessible, low-intensity support for youth in distress. It can be integrated into mental health promotion activities to deliver high-quality, responsive care.

Future studies should examine how such platforms can foster professional help-seeking when needed, leveraging peer norms and behavioral nudges.

A high prevalence of psychological distress and unmet mental health needs among youth, combined with a preference for self-reliance and informal support (e.g., peers), poses a major public health challenge. Growing reliance on digital platforms highlights the potential of anonymized online peer support forums as accessible first-line avenues of support. In India, research on peer support interventions remains scarce. This study aimed to identify the concerns for which Indian youth engage in an anonymized, moderated online peer support forum, as well as the purposes for posting. A retrospective qualitative design was employed, analyzing all 137 posts of 124 unique users received between February 2024 and October 2025 on the forum using hybrid thematic analysis. Findings revealed that user posts encompassed diverse concerns across personal, relational, social, and achievement domains. Feeling states emerged as the most prominent theme, frequently co-occurring with other themes, followed by self-related concerns. Several posts explicitly mentioned mental health concerns such as depression and social anxiety, often without mention of professional help-seeking suggestions. Family-related issues, romantic relationship concerns, academic pressures, social comparisons, and unmet needs for approval were some of the other themes that emerged. Shifting from content to motivations for posting, the analysis identified purposes such as venting distress, seeking suggestions, sharing reflections, engaging in meaning-making, and seeking reassurance or validation. Future work needs to examine whether such forums can function not only as spaces for strengthening self-help and peer support processes but also as avenues for improving professional help-seeking through normalization and encouragement of the same when appropriate.