Springer Mental Health Informatics: 491 (Studies in Computational Intelligence, 491)

This book introduces approaches that may transform the daily practice of psychiatrists and psychologists, including the asynchronous communication between mental health care providers and clients as well as the automation of assessment and therapy. Review From the reviews: “This book describes screening methods and approaches such as speech and language analyses that may be used to acquire clinical data about patients and employ them in treating mental illness. … This book is intended for high-level mental healthcare providers, particularly those who are inclined to appreciate and apply the vast number of tools and technology in their clinical arena. Those who have a special interest in informatics and research would benefit from this book as well.” (Sheila Lahijani, Doody’s Book Reviews, April, 2014) From the Back Cover This book introduces approaches that have the potential to transform the daily practice of psychiatrists and psychologists. This includes the asynchronous communication between mental health care providers and clients as well as the automation of assessment and therapy. Speech and language are particularly interesting from the viewpoint of psychological assessment. For instance, depression may change the characteristics of voice in individuals and these changes can be detected by a special form of speech analysis. Computational screening methods that utilise speech and language can detect subtle changes and alert clinicians as well as individuals and caregivers. The use of online technologies in mental health, however, poses ethical problems that will occupy concerned individuals, governments and the wider public for some time. Assuming that these ethical problems can be solved, it should be possible to diagnose and treat mental health disorders online (excluding the use of medication).