Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 May 11;9(5):e30716.
doi: 10.2196/30716.

Ownership, Use of, and Interest in Digital Mental Health Technologies Among Clinicians and Young People Across a Spectrum of Clinical Care Needs: Cross-sectional Survey

Imogen H Bell  1   2 , Andrew Thompson  1   2   3 , Lee Valentine  1   2 , Sophie Adams  4 , Mario Alvarez-Jimenez  1   2 , Jennifer Nicholas  1   2
Affiliations

Ownership, Use of, and Interest in Digital Mental Health Technologies Among Clinicians and Young People Across a Spectrum of Clinical Care Needs: Cross-sectional Survey

Imogen H Bell et al. JMIR Ment Health. .

Abstract

Background: There is currently an increased interest in and acceptance of technology-enabled mental health care. To adequately harness this opportunity, it is critical that the design and development of digital mental health technologies be informed by the needs and preferences of end users. Despite young people and clinicians being the predominant users of such technologies, few studies have examined their perspectives on different digital mental health technologies.

Objective: This study aims to understand the technologies that young people have access to and use in their everyday lives and what applications of these technologies they are interested in to support their mental health. The study also explores the technologies that youth mental health clinicians currently use within their practice and what applications of these technologies they are interested in to support their clients' mental health.

Methods: Youth mental health service users (aged 12-25 years) from both primary and specialist services, young people from the general population (aged 16-25 years), and youth mental health clinicians completed a web-based survey exploring technology ownership, use of, and interest levels in using different digital interventions to support their mental health or that of their clients.

Results: A total of 588 young people and 73 youth mental health clinicians completed the survey. Smartphone ownership or private access among young people within mental health services and the general population was universal (611/617, 99%), with high levels of access to computers and social media. Youth technology use was frequent, with 63.3% (387/611) using smartphones several times an hour. Clinicians reported using smartphones (61/76, 80%) and video chat (69/76, 91%) commonly in clinical practice and found them to be helpful. Approximately 50% (296/609) of the young people used mental health apps, which was significantly less than the clinicians (χ23=28.8, n=670; P<.001). Similarly, clinicians were significantly more interested in using technology for mental health support than young people (H3=55.90; P<.001), with 100% (73/73) of clinicians being at least slightly interested in technology to support mental health compared with 88% (520/591) of young people. Follow-up tests revealed no difference in interest between young people from the general population, primary mental health services, and specialist mental health services (all P>.23). Young people were most interested in web-based self-help, mobile self-help, and blended therapy.

Conclusions: Technology access is pervasive among young people within and outside of youth mental health services; clinicians are already using technology to support clinical care, and there is widespread interest in digital mental health technologies among these groups of end users. These findings provide important insights into the perspectives of young people and clinicians regarding the value of digital mental health interventions in supporting youth mental health.

Keywords: adolescent; attitude; clinician; digital mental health; digital technology; internet-based interventions; mental health; mental health services; mobile phone; youth mental health.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest: None declared.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Young people’s average frequency of use across technologies that they have access to (as presented in Table 2).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Clinicians’ perceived helpfulness of different technologies that they have used within clinical care (as presented in Table 2).
Figure 3
Figure 3
The average level of interest in different technological approaches to support mental health across the 4 participant groups: young people general population (n=306), young people primary services (n=229), young people specialist services (n=53), and clinicians (n=73). AR: augmented reality; MH: mental health; SM: social media; VR: virtual reality; YP: young people.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Level of interest in each of the participant groups for different categories of mental health technology.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Hollis C, Falconer CJ, Martin JL, Whittington C, Stockton S, Glazebrook C, Davies EB. Annual research review: digital health interventions for children and young people with mental health problems - a systematic and meta-review. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2017;58(4):474–503. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.12663. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Erbe D, Eichert HC, Riper H, Ebert DD. Blending face-to-face and internet-based interventions for the treatment of mental disorders in adults: systematic review. J Med Internet Res. 2017;19(9):e306. doi: 10.2196/jmir.6588. https://www.jmir.org/2017/9/e306/ v19i9e306 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Hollis C, Morriss R, Martin J, Amani S, Cotton R, Denis M, Lewis S. Technological innovations in mental healthcare: harnessing the digital revolution. Br J Psychiatry. 2015;206(4):263–5. doi: 10.1192/bjp.bp.113.142612.S0007125000278677 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Mobile fact sheet. Pew Research Center. 2021. [2021-05-19]. https://www.pewinternet.org/fact-sheet/mobile/
    1. Burns JM, Birrell E, Bismark M, Pirkis J, Davenport TA, Hickie IB, Weinberg MK, Ellis LA. The role of technology in Australian youth mental health reform. Aust Health Rev. 2016;40(5):584–90. doi: 10.1071/AH15115.AH15115 - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources