Harnessing Technology to Promote the Human Rights of Persons with Psychosocial Disabilities: Evaluating the WHO QualityRights e-training among Caregivers

Background: The thesis explores the use of technology in the training and evaluation of caregivers to promote human rights of persons with psychosocial disabilities. The objective is to assess the effectiveness of this technology to support its large-scale implementation as a prevention tool, ensuring accessibility and adaptability. Methods: The thesis includes a randomized controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the effectiveness of the WHO QualityRights training compared to a control intervention, a validation study to analyze the psychometric properties of the instruments used in the RCT, both administered online, and a cross-sectional observational study to assess caregivers' perception of respect for rights in mental health services, which serves as a preliminary study to the RCT and aims to introduce the topic of human rights. Results: The preliminary results of the RCT show a significant improvement in attitudes (+24.8%, p < 0.001) and knowledge of human rights (+43.2%, p < 0.001) in the experimental group compared to the control group. The psychometric validation confirmed the reliability and validity of the WHO instruments (α knowledge = 0.90, α attitudes = 0.87). The cross-sectional study highlighted a positive perception of respect for rights but significant dissatisfaction with the lack of resources in mental health services. The confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) confirmed a unidimensional structure with excellent fit indices (CFI = 0.959, RMSEA = 0.068, α = 0.83). The WHO QualityRights training has preliminarily proven effective in improving caregivers' knowledge and attitudes towards persons with psychosocial disabilities as rights holders. The completion of the study will provide data from a larger sample, allowing for further verification of these findings. The use of technology in caregiver training could be a key element in implementing a scalable, accessible, adaptable, and cost-effective preventive approach.