Robot-mediated interventions for youth mental health

Abstract

Evidence-based therapies have proven effective in treating the mental health of adolescents. However, these interventions are not without shortcomings: therapies are costly and not accessible for everyone who needs them; psychologists are scarce, with more adolescents needing support than therapists available. We contribute to mental health support tools with a digital robot agent that delivers micro-interventions to adolescents. Our key insight is that translating therapies traditionally provided in a physical workbook format to an interactive robot uncovers therapeutic mechanisms that promote healing. We present our translation process from workbook to robot-mediated therapy, which include the co-design of a robot with adolescents and heuristic evaluations with evidence-based clinical psychologists. This work presents a preliminary study with adolescents in which they used both the workbook (traditional medium) and the digital robot (interactive medium) during two consecutive weeks. Results show both a preference for the robot and more engagement of this treatment delivery option.