Frontier mental health research: psychedelics & drug studies

Delivering Cognitive Behavior Therapy to Young Adults With Symptoms of Depression and Anxiety Using a Fully Automated Conversational Agent (Woebot): A Randomized Controlled Trial

Kathleen Kara Fitzpatrick, Alison Darcy, Molly Vierhile

JMIR Mental Health • Summary & key facts • 2017 • 2,318 citations

This small randomized trial tested a fully automated text-based conversational agent called Woebot as a way to deliver cognitive behavioral therapy to college-age young adults with symptoms of depression and anxiety. Over 2 weeks, the Woebot group (n=34) showed a statistically larger drop in depression scores (PHQ-9) than an information-only…

Digital Mental Health Interventions Impact of Technology on Adolescents Mental Health Research Topics

Making health habitual: the psychology of ‘habit-formation’ and general practice

Benjamin Gardner, Phillippa Lally, Jane Wardle

British Journal of General Practice • Summary & key facts • 2012 • 550 citations

This paper explains how habits form and how doctors might use habit-based advice in routine care. It says repeating a simple action in the same context can make that action automatic, so it needs less attention and may last after motivation falls. The authors report studies (for example, an average…

Behavioral Health and Interventions Health Policy Implementation Science Mental Health and Psychiatry

Social Media Use and Its Connection to Mental Health: A Systematic Review

Fazida Karim, Azeezat Abimbola Oyewande, Lamis F Abdalla, Reem Chaudhry Ehsanullah, Safeera Khan

Cureus • Summary & key facts • 2020 • 367 citations

This systematic review looked at research on social media and mental health. The authors state that social media are responsible for making mental health problems worse. They searched 50 papers and, after applying selection rules, included 16 studies. The final papers were checked for quality and included a mix of…

Digital Mental Health Interventions Impact of Technology on Adolescents Social Media in Health Education

Efficacy of digital cognitive behavioral therapy for moderate‐to‐severe symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder: A randomized controlled trial

Jenna R. Carl, Christopher B. Miller, Alasdair L. Henry, Michelle L. Davis, Richard Stott, Jasper A. J. Smits, et al.

Depression and Anxiety • Summary & key facts • 2020 • 80 citations

Digital CBT (Daylight) appears to be safe and efficacious for symptoms of anxiety, worry, and further measures of mental health compared with waitlist control in individuals with GAD.

Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes Digital Mental Health Interventions Mental Health Research Topics

Anxiety and Performance in Sex, Sport, and Stage: Identifying Common Ground

David L. Rowland, Jacques van Lankveld

Frontiers in Psychology • Summary & key facts • 2019 • 75 citations

Anxiety has long been linked to worse performance in evaluative social settings such as sex, sport, and stage. This paper asks three main questions: how each field understands anxiety and performance, what they can learn from one another, and how they could share useful ideas. The authors review existing models…

Behavioral Health and Interventions Motivation and Self-Concept in Sports Sport Psychology and Performance

Narrative meaning making and integration: Toward a better understanding of the way falling ill influences quality of life

Iris D. Hartog, Michael Scherer‐Rath, Renske Kruizinga, Justine E. Netjes, José P.S. Henriques, Pythia T. Nieuwkerk, et al.

Journal of Health Psychology • Summary & key facts • 2017 • 68 citations

This article offers a new humanities-based theory about how falling seriously ill can affect a person’s quality of life. The authors combine ideas about contingency (the feeling that life could have been different), narrative identity (how people make life stories), and quality of life to explain how people make meaning…

Identity, Memory, and Therapy Optimism, Hope, and Well-being Resilience and Mental Health

Effectiveness of Digital Mental Health Tools to Reduce Depressive and Anxiety Symptoms in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Jiyeong Kim, Lois Maame Donkor Aryee, Heejung Bang, Steffi Prajogo, Yong Kyung Choi, Jeffrey S. Hoch, et al.

JMIR Mental Health • Summary & key facts • 2023 • 63 citations

The researchers did a large, careful search for studies of digital mental health tools (things like websites, phone apps, text messages, or online therapy) aimed at reducing depression and anxiety in low- and middle-income countries. They only kept randomized controlled trials, which are studies where people are randomly put into…

Digital Mental Health Interventions Impact of Technology on Adolescents Mental Health Research Topics

Exploring the Ethical Challenges of Conversational AI in Mental Health Care: Scoping Review

Mehrdad Rahsepar Meadi, Tomas Sillekens, Suzanne Metselaar, Anton J.L.M. van Balkom, Justin Bernstein, Neeltje M. Batelaan

JMIR Mental Health • Summary & key facts • 2025 • 59 citations

This scoping review looks at the ethical issues raised by conversational AI (CAI) in mental health care. It finds that AI tools are already in use or development, but there is little specific ethical discussion or formal codes of practice. The review shows some topics are underexplored and that the…

Digital Mental Health Interventions Mental Health via Writing Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments

Internet-Delivered Versus Face-to-Face Cognitive Behavior Therapy for Anxiety Disorders: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Narges Esfandiari, Mohammad A Mazaheri, Saeed Akbari-Zardkhaneh, Vahid Sadeghi-Firoozabadi, Mona Cheraghi

PubMed Central (PMC) • Summary & key facts • 2021 • 41 citations

This review pooled data from trials that directly compared therapist-guided internet-delivered CBT (ICBT) with face-to-face CBT for anxiety disorders. Eight randomized studies were included, and the combined result showed a near-zero difference between the two formats (Hedges' g = 0.01, 95% CI −0.16 to 0.18). The authors concluded that ICBT…

Digital Mental Health Interventions Impact of Technology on Adolescents Mental Health Research Topics

Human-Human vs Human-AI Therapy: An Empirical Study

Mohammad Amin Kuhail, Nazik Alturki, Justin Thomas, Amal K. Alkhalifa, Amal Alshardan

International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction • Summary & key facts • 2024 • 39 citations

Sixty-three mental health therapists read therapy transcripts from early-stage sessions and could not reliably tell which were with a human therapist and which were with Pi, a conversational AI. Their average accuracy was 53.9%, which is about what you would expect by chance. On average, therapists rated the AI transcripts…

AI in Service Interactions Digital Mental Health Interventions Ethics and Social Impacts of AI

Aggression as successful self‐control

David S. Chester

Social and Personality Psychology Compass • Summary & key facts • 2023 • 16 citations

This paper challenges the common idea that aggression only happens when self-control fails. It reviews many studies that show aggression can also result from successful self-control. The author explains how theories of aggression could be changed to include both cases, and says this opens new research questions. The paper also…

Behavioral Health and Interventions Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion Mental Health Research Topics

Relationship between depressive symptoms and anemia among the middle-aged and elderly: a cohort study over 4-year period

Congqi Liu, Ruihao Zhou, Xilin Peng, Tao Zhu, Wei Wei, Xuechao Hao

BMC Psychiatry • Summary & key facts • 2023 • 13 citations

This study used China’s CHARLS data from 2011 and 2015 to look at people aged 45 and older. In 10,179 people at baseline, higher depressive symptom scores were linked to lower hemoglobin and to having anemia. Over 4 years (5,887 people followed), people with depressive symptoms had higher odds of…

Health disparities and outcomes Maternal Mental Health During Pregnancy and Postpartum Optimism, Hope, and Well-being