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Something I really worry about with these apps is that they now have a financial incentive to find more people with mental health issues. Mental health issues

• dymk 5y ago
  Your linked wikipedia article describes behaviors or emotions spreading through social groups, but this doesn't mean that mental illness spreads through social groups. "Contagion" doesn't mean "illness", it means "meme". Is there actually research showing that mental illnesses spread through social groups?
  • thepasswordis 5y ago
    I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here. Behaviors and emotions are descriptive of the "issue" part of mental health issues. Behaviors and emotions are the symptoms.
    • dymk 5y ago
      I think I'm not understanding your initial point - are you saying that these apps need to find people with mental health issues (which makes sense), or that these apps are incentivized to start inducing mental health issues in people in order to increase their customer base, and that's something we need to worry about? I see in your initial comment, you talk about these apps diagnosing people and that causing somebody to develop the actual disease (I guess like a reverse placebo).
      • irjustin 5y ago
        OP is trying to say you might have some tendencies that aren't problematic, but once you find a group who normalizes or somehow inadvertently encourages (i.e. via searching for profits) those behaviors that it turns into a real problem. Whether that set of behaviors is just a behavioral problem or a diagnosable disease, I'll leave that to the experts.
  • aspaceman 5y ago
    Yes. The most common are those experienced by young people- teenaged girls. Ex: eating disorders, self harm, and personality disorders. There's also been recent findings relating to involuntary movement disorders. (Women claim to have tourettes like symptoms. They watched a lot of social media -> picked up involuntary habits that look similar. Not tourettes, but a psychological issue.) Could start here for research: > Findings in this literature are consistent with social modeling/learning of NSSI increasing risk of initial engagement in NSSI among individuals with certain individual and/or psychiatric characteristics. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13811118.2013.748404?casa_token=RDTJ5wpOu2cAAAAA%3AHCWfz3bwk_CZ5lMWJQ_I2IWlGKQG-CQv4aRfNHLNY-4MRAORk2tonN4KBA7MV2MW6hXCuPoDcxkFyA https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13811118.2013.7... NSSI meaning non-suicidal self injury.
  • deepnotderp 5y ago
    Yes, see eg suicide clusters
    • aspaceman 5y ago
      This may be off-topic, but I first learned of this via the Japanese anime: "Welcome to the NHK" - has stuck with me ever since.
• RileyJames 5y ago
  I’ve had a similar concern regarding mental health through NDIS in Australia. There seems to be a requirement for a diagnosis in order to receive care through the NDIS (mental health care system). Which results in practitioners giving a diagnosis immediately based on “I think you might have this, so let’s connect you with a psychologist/etc to dig deeper and find out”. That’s simply the bureaucratic path through the system. But my concern is that patients looking for an answer hear, and identify with, “I have xxxx, that explains it!!” When you also take into account that some symptoms are comorbid, and may entirely disappear upon the underlying issue being resolved or managed. And that’s just the bureaucratic incentives. I’m unclear on the professional & revenue incentives for diagnosis and referral to other professionals, possibly within the same umbrella organisation.
• nopenopenopeno 5y ago
  I was convinced by a therapist (who first convinced my parents) that I have aspergers after talking to them for like 20 minutes and taking an IQ test. At first, it seemed pointless to care one way or another, but for a brief time I bought into it and started viewing myself as disabled or special and it started influencing my behavior and relationships. Then I came to my senses and swore off of it and have been so much better off since.
  • LNSY 5y ago
    I don't think you can "swear off" your neurology, but it's good you don't see it as a disability. It isn't.
    • Negitivefrags 5y ago
      If thought alone were not able to help with mental afflictions, then how would therapy have any effect?
      • joaogui1 5y ago
        Aspergers/ASD is a neurological condition, not just psychological
      • Jim_Heckler 5y ago
        Because dysfunctional thought when alone cannot be challenged, and becomes self reinforcing. A therapist helps a patient examine the ways in which their thinking is detrimental to their wellbeing.
        • nopenopenopeno 5y ago
          Theoretically, maybe. But they could just as likely, or maybe more likely, just make it worse. They definitely made it worse it ny case. It was a very reckless process, from my perspective.
      • lazyasciiart 5y ago
• fragmede 5y ago
  DBT is an evidence-based psychotherapy and it specifically calls out catastrophizing as one of the 10 unhelpful thinking styles. Whether practitioners should be specifically trained in DBT vs some other modality is up for debate, but catastrophizing's not this unknown systemic risk - it's just more of healthcare under capitalism, which is rife with these sort of issues.
• jrmg 5y ago
  I am absolutely sure that if I had been given the out of ‘having anxiety’ as a young adult, my life would’ve gone very differently, and probably very much worse, than it has. I think I would’ve allowed myself to lean into my tendency to be introverted and possibly ended up friendless and alone, and in an unfulfilling job. Note that I’m not denying that people might have mental illnesses that have deep rooted or physical causes that _need_ therapy or medication in order to live a fulfilling life.
  • jcims 5y ago
    I’m struggling with this now with one of my children. All of the professional/medical support she is receiving is reinforcing the same notion and I’m left with nothing but an intuition that it’s ultimately destructive or at least limiting. She has been and still is going through some tremendously stressful situations however and I’m trying to balance that against the fact that more stress is on the way. I completely agree with you but it’s tough.
    • redis_mlc 5y ago
    • d0gsg0w00f 5y ago
      This is a tough one and also one of my fears with my child. Take comfort in knowing that despite how powerful external forces may seem that you as her parent have an even more powerful influence. A wise man once told me "kids will never ever do what you say but will always do what you do". I would show her that obstacles are intrinsic to life. We are wired for struggle. Our struggles are what define us. Even when we have no struggles we tend to manufacture them just so we can overcome them and give meaning to our life. If she wants to give her struggle a label as x condition then that's fine, what matters is what her path should be to overcome that condition. Jordan Peterson talks about this a lot, especially in "12 Rules For Life" and in his lectures about his daughter's medical condition. I couldn't find the relevant quote but he touches on it in this lecture segment [1] [1] - https://youtu.be/VrNM-JCGGfI https://youtu.be/VrNM-JCGGfI
• jimkleiber 5y ago
  I've been working in this space for about 10 years. I've struggled with the business side of things, especially pricing and more so, the idea of it being easier to have return customers than new customers. Prior to working in this, I worked in development economics consulting in East Africa and also struggled with the idea that if development aid is working, then many consultants work themselves out of a job. If the market is large enough, yes, people can help one customer fully resolve a problem and then move to another, yet, it still can seem easier to maintain the same customer. That being said, I imagine that same idea comes into play in most service-related fields that are trying to solve a problem: consulting, law, healthcare, and more. But maybe it feels more scary because with emotional health, it can cut deeper than most consulting gigs.
• Nowado 5y ago
  Their incentive system looks the same as any for-profit mental health organization. Not saying that solves it, I just don't see why would apps worry you particularly much in context of issues you're pointing out.
  • heavyset_go 5y ago
    I don't necessarily agree with the premise of the OP we're responding to, but apps and computer services have the ability to scale in ways that other mental health organizations don't, especially if they have a lot of investor funding to burn. A service that was used by ten thousand people in January could be used by a quarter of the country by June, and it can quickly command the market and put its competitors out of business.
    • Nowado 5y ago
      I will also preface by saying, that there very much is an issue with having for-profit (mental) health system. That said, I don't think what you're pointing at goes beyond issue of monopolization (giving one side of the market relatively more power) and those previously mentioned. To give an example, you'd achieve the same problem if they simply created 'mental health board' interest group with PR and lobbying - those can be very powerful, my personal favourite example being pork producers making 'bacon' a cool thing. Putting competition out of business seems tangential to other points in the thread, unless I'm missing something. The problem is inherent, apps just streamline process and make it more clear. Relaying on disorganization of some class to produce friction that will limit their whole effectiveness (including part that is clearly harmful) is a delay tactic at best, not a solution.
• stadium 5y ago
  >> It's an extremely treacherous situation. Hyperbole aside, access to mental health services isn't going to invent mental health issues for most people. There's an extremely large underserved population without access to any mental health services. And even with access it can take months to get an appointment. The services need to be as highly regulated as offline mental health services to protect patients. Besides that, it's a many times over net positive on society if people get the help they need. It's a net positive even if a few people need attention and get that by faking or acting out a mental health disorder.
• light_hue_1 5y ago
  > Something I really worry about with these apps is that they now have a financial incentive to find more people with mental health issues. And thank goodness they are getting more people in. The biggest problem in mental health is that the majority of people who need help don't get it. > Mental health issues can spread socially No they can't. There is zero evidence that you can get clinical depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, or anything else serious socially.
  • chii 5y ago
    > There is zero evidence that you can get clinical depression ... socially it's more likely that because someone you know or interact with socially admitting to having depression, and thus, clear the stigma for yourself to also admit/recognize it too. Might actually be a good outcome.
  • forgotmyoldname 5y ago
    Financial incentives to "get everyone in" are very much not a good thing. It wasn't too long ago that ADD/ADHD panic was absolutely massive. Half the boys at my school were on ADHD meds. Any time a boy acted out, teachers at my school would make a call to their parents to persuade them to see a doctor and get some ritalin or whatever else they handed out by the bucketful. I was a quiet kid and sometimes--maybe once a week--would have goofy moments and that was enough to have my family get a call. 10 year old boys aren't meant to be chained down to desks all day--meds and ADD panic were a way for people to solve a "problem" of energetic kids and someone was glad to make money off it. Some kids do legitimately have disorders and need help, but some things we just grow out of. This stuff shouldn't be for profit. Someone, somewhere, is all too eager to get people hooked on the idea that they have a problem and the only cure is what they're selling. Digital marketers and tech investors in particular are eager to jump on this. They love preying on the vulnerable and making them feel more vulnerable.
    • Ekaros 5y ago
      I think back on Finnish school system. Where lessons were 45 minute with 15 minute break outside every hour. I can see that sort of regime clearly helping the boys with normal attention spans and need to get some energy off... And I think just this alone helped to manage most of them to regular adulthood.
• mcintyre1994 5y ago
  I find the advertising for them really uncomfortable to be honest. One thing I've heard on a few podcast adverts (so I assume it's copy from the company rather than hosts personal feelings) for BetterHelp is that it's bad to put your mental health concerns on your family/friends, that you don't want to burden them. They have their own concerns, they don't want to hear yours. Whereas mental health charities, especially those focused on men, often have campaigns around getting people to talk to each other. My concern is that the way these companies are marketed will discourage people who can't afford their product from talking to their family/friends and leave them struggling alone. And from the article, people who can't afford their product describes a lot of people: > So she joined BetterHelp, a popular therapy app. She paid $65 each week but spent most of her time waiting for her assigned counsellor to respond.
  • sweetheart 5y ago
    My fiancé is a licensed therapist and is quick to elaborate on the myriad ways that BetterHelp is an absolutely terrible company, for client and therapist alike. I also used it for a couple months a few years ago and gained nothing from it. Seeing an “actual” therapist afterwards made the differences in quality of treatment immediately obvious.
• avgcorrection 5y ago
  History is a circle: we’re now going back to “just tough it out/you’re imagining things”.