Gen Z — those born between 1997 and 2012 — may be the youngest working generation, but they’re expected to comprise 30% of the workforce by 2030, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Gen Z teens and young adults have also reported the highest stress levels among all age groups, and research shows they are having the hardest time adjusting to life during and after the pandemic.

This has led to elevated levels of anxiety and depression in Gen Z — 42% of the generation have received a mental health diagnosis, and 91% have reported experiencing at least one physical or emotional symptom associated with poor mental health. 

One company founded on the mission of addressing this crisis recently received some new funding. Wave Life — a mental health platform designed for Gen Z —  on Tuesday closed a $6 million seed investment led by Santé Ventures.

Wave Life was founded in 2021 by Sarah Adler, a clinical psychologist and clinical associate professor at Stanford’s psychiatry department. 

“I founded Wave Life because I think there’s a massive need to increase access to high quality mental healthcare. We’re in the middle of a massive access to care crisis for young people. And ultimately, there are certain levers that I believe we can pull to tackle that access crisis that the current healthcare system just simply isn’t addressing,” she said in a recent interview.

The name of Adler’s company was originally Gray Life. The idea was to move young people away from viewing life as black and white — this thinking can be quite easy to fall into, but it is a fundamental indicator of poor mental health and emotional wellbeing, Adler declared. The company’s name was meant to invite young people to “step into the gray” instead of adhering to black-and-white thinking.

But when the company tested this name among its users, they said it was way too depressing. So the name changed to Wave Life, which has the same connotation — that life is a wave, filled with complexities and changes that often can’t be controlled.

“The concept is about really being able to ride that wave and tolerate the uncertainty of really real things. That is a fundamentally important skill set that Gen Z needs,” Adler said.

Amidst young people’s mental health crisis in this country, there is also a severe lack of mental healthcare providers. Not only are traditional psychotherapy appointments difficult to access, but they’re also not for everybody. 

Many members of Gen Z have reported that therapy is either unaffordable, too difficult to find in a timely manner, or it isn’t in line with their desire for personalized, easy access, Adler pointed out.

“Traditional psychotherapy usually comes when people are having an acute crisis — something happened or their symptoms got so bad that they needed to go into therapy. But we actually fundamentally believe that mental health is something that you should be thinking about more like dental health. You should be thinking about it every day — sometimes you need to just be brushing your teeth and flossing, and sometimes you actually need to go to the dentist when something more serious is happening,” Adler explained.

Through its platform, Wave Life offers a three-pronged care model. It provides scientific-backed mental health information on social media, an app with interactive exercises, and emotional health and wellness coaching. 

The platform’s emotional health and wellness coaches provide on-demand support, and the app gives users ongoing progress measurement that encourages introspection and vulnerability. The app also includes personalized interactive content that helps users understand the science and psychology behind their actions and feelings, as well as quizzes to determine emotional strengths and areas for improvement.

“We want to meet Gen Z where they are rather than chastise them for using their phone. The app really allows for that sort of 24/7 coverage, as well as our emotional wellbeing coaches,” Adler declared.

She declined to share data on how many users Wave Life has, but she said these users access the platform either on a direct-to-consumer basis or through their employer’s benefits.

With its new funding, the company is seeking to move further into the employer market. Wave Life’s care model can help Gen Z employees learn skills that help them become more engaged, get better at communicating and gain an increased sense of belonging in the workplace, resulting in more satisfied workers, Adler pointed out.

But Wave Life is not the only mental health startup offering a platform for young people — there’s also companies like Brightline, Ginger and Fort Health. Wave Life differentiates itself by focusing not on therapy, but rather how good emotional habits can be implemented into daily life to maintain mental health, Adler declared.

She also explained that Wave Life plans to stand out from the crowd further by using some of its new funding to conduct research on its care model’s outcomes. 

“We’re committed to demonstrating that what we’re doing is not just another solution on the marketplace. We want to show very publicly that it is working. We will be doing research on our work and collecting data that will demonstrate that we are actually providing a service that can be effective. We believe this research is not actually done as much as it should be in the mental health space, and it is unethical not to,” Adler said.

Photo: VioletaStoimenova, Getty Images