Listening to those who know: The Need for forming advisory boards with lived experiences in global mental health research

Global mental health research increasingly prioritizes cultural relevance and equity, yet the integration of lived experience remains limited, particularly in mental health research where social and cultural contexts shape distress and help-seeking. This commentary draws on longitudinal engagement with Youth Advisory Boards (YABs) and Community Advisory Boards (CABs) in Nepal, informed by roles spanning advisory membership to doctoral research. It highlights how advisory boards contribute across the research lifecycle, including shaping research questions, refining instruments, strengthening ethical practices, and supporting interpretation of findings. Notably, their involvement as co-analytic partners in qualitative research enhances contextual validity and interpretive depth through experiential knowledge. The paper also examines key challenges, such as navigating power imbalances, ensuring emotional safety, and addressing logistical and resource constraints. It argues that meaningful engagement requires sustained collaboration, transparency, and careful attention to relational dynamics, rather than tokenistic inclusion. Overall, the commentary positions advisory boards as essential to producing rigorous, ethical, and contextually grounded research, supporting a shift from extractive models toward participatory and co-produced approaches that enhance both scientific quality and real-world relevance in global mental health. Mental health research aims to improve people’s well-being, but it does not always fully include the voices of those with direct experience of mental health difficulties. This is especially important in countries like Nepal, where experiences of distress are shaped by family relationships, social expectations, culture, and stigma. When these realities are not included, research may miss what people are actually going through. This paper is based on my personal journey working with Youth Advisory Boards (YABs) and Community Advisory Boards (CABs) in mental health research. Over time, I have been involved in different roles: first as a young advisory member, then as a research coordinator and study manager, and now as a doctoral researcher. These boards included young people and community members with lived experience of mental health challenges and suicidality. My experiences show that advisory boards can play an important role at every stage of research. They help shape research questions, improve study tools, guide ethical decisions, and ensure that sensitive topics like suicide are discussed in safe and culturally appropriate ways. They also help researchers better understand what participants really mean. For example, in my study, advisory members explained that a common Nepali word for “difficulty” actually reflects many combined pressures, such as family expectations and financial stress, rather than a single problem. The paper also shows that advisory boards are most valuable when they are treated as partners, not just consulted occasionally. When they are meaningfully involved throughout the research process, they help produce knowledge that is more accurate, culturally relevant, and ethically sound. At the same time, working with advisory boards can be challenging. It requires time, resources, careful planning, and attention to power differences and emotional safety. Overall, this paper argues that listening to people with lived experience is not only the right thing to do, but also improves the quality of research. Advisory boards can help make mental health research more inclusive, grounded in real life, and useful for communities.