Ana İçerik

Mind Over Social Media – Innovative Training Development for

Youth Workers (MOSAIC) Project

Supported by the Turkish National Agency under Erasmus+ KA220-YOU (Cooperation Partnerships in the Field of Youth), the "Mind Over Social Media – Innovative Training Development for Youth Workers (MOSAIC)" project is being implemented in collaboration with the Marmara University Institute of Population and Social Research, the Turkish Green Crescent Society, the Green Crescent Serbia (Zeleni krst), and the Malta-based Ahead – Institute for Societal Advancement. Spanning a total of 30 months, the project aims to enhance youth workers' competencies in the area of social media addiction and to enable them to provide young people with more informed and more effective support.

Within the scope of the project, the goal is for youth workers to gain comprehensive knowledge of the causes, effects, and prevention strategies of social media addiction, to be able to convey this knowledge to young people through practical methods, and to adopt the new approaches required by the digital age. In this way, through well-informed youth workers, young people will be supported in establishing a healthy balance with the digital world, contributing to the reduction of social media addiction in the long term.

In addition to the priority of increasing the quality, innovation, and recognition of youth work, the project also directly contributes to the priorities of digital transformation and strengthening inclusion. Accordingly, the project is planned to produce three tangible outputs: a comprehensive field research report based on fieldwork conducted in the partner countries; training content for youth workers, comprising theoretical and practical knowledge, to be developed under the leadership of the Green Crescent; and an online learning platform, led by the Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Youth and Sports, through which the training materials will be digitalized and made accessible.

Kick-off Meeting

In January 2026, the partners came together at a meeting organized by the Ministry of Youth and Sports in Ankara.

Needs Analysis Study (WP2)

Our institute led the Needs Analysis, the second work package of the project. Within this work package, each partner conducted fieldwork in their own country to collect up-to-date data on social media addiction. The various social, cultural, and economic dynamics associated with social media addiction were analyzed through surveys, focus group studies, and one-on-one interviews conducted with youth workers and young people.

The results of the field research carried out by the partners in their respective countries were brought together in a comprehensive comparative analysis under the leadership of Marmara University. In this way, the current situation, needs, and good practices related to social media addiction in the different countries were identified, ensuring that the training modules to be developed are grounded in the real needs of youth workers, scientifically valid, and culturally adaptable.

Transnational Project Meeting (TPM)

At the meeting held in Istanbul on 6–7 July 2026, all partners came together to evaluate the data obtained from the fieldwork. The results of the comparative analysis were shared at the meeting; the knowledge and skills most needed by youth workers were identified, and the strategies to be followed in the subsequent phases of the project were determined. Accordingly, the outputs of the needs analysis will directly guide the training content currently under development and the online learning platform.