Dr. Lisa D. Hawke is a staff scientist with the McCain Centre for Child and Youth Mental Health at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). She is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. Dr. Hawke received her PhD from Université Laval in Québec City in psychology, then completed a post-doctoral research fellowship at Toronto’s University Health Network. At CAMH, Dr. Hawke's research focuses on the engagement of people with lived experience in mental health and substance use research. She also conducts research on topics of high priority to people with lived experience, including youth mental health. She has a particular interest in improving engagement process, understanding lived experiences of mental health and mental health systems, and examining aspects of stigma and stigma reduction. Dr.Hawke has funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and other funding bodies to pursue this line of work.
Digital Conversational Agents for Youth Mental Health:
Part 1. A literature review and qualitative study
Youth are high users of digital technology, but there is a lack of research on the use of AI chatbots for youth with mental health conditions. We reviewed the recent scientific literature to understand the current state of the research on AI chatbots. There is a small and emerging body of research on AI chatbots for youth mental health. Acceptability of interventions delivered through AI chatbot technology seems to be high, but there is very little research examining
whether AI chatbots are effective for vulnerable youth. We then held focus groups with 28 youth with multiple mental health conditions to understand their perspectives on AI chatbot use. Youth described a cautious optimism. They recognized that AI chatbots could have quite a number of practical benefits for youth with mental health conditions, but they also raised a number of concerns around confidentiality, safety, crisis support, and other key issues. Youth described that they wanted AI chatbots to be flexible and customizable, with strong confidentiality and safety protocols, reliable content, and a human-like communication style. This work led to a number of recommendations for intervention developers and researchers to guide the future development and testing of AI chatbots for youth mental health. This work was funded by the Ontario Brain Institute.
Manuscripts:
This paper reviews the recent literature on AI chatbots for the mental health of service-seeking youth:
This paper presents youth perspectives on the acceptability and use of AI chatbots for the mental health of youth with multiple mental health conditions:
This paper describes youths’ preferences for the design features that an AI chatbot for youth mental health should have:
This paper synthesizes the program of research and proposes recommendations to guide researchers and intervention developers in the youth mental health AI chatbot space.
Part 2. Refining an AI chatbot for youth mental health in clinical care: A CAMH consultation
The team is now working with AIMHI Health to provide guidance on the development and refinement of an AI chatbot for youth mental health. AIMHI Health is a UK-based organization aiming to transform mental health services through a unique hybrid of intelligent technology and compassionate human care. They have developed an AI chatbot prototype for young people, together with a plan for structured integration with clinical care.
The study team is now conducting a series of some 15 consultations with young people to deeply understand their perspectives on the use of the AI chatbot and how to optimize it for implementation. We are also consulting with clinicians and caregivers for additional guidance. Through this work, we are engaging in ongoing conversation with AIMHI Health and youth, alongside caregivers and clinicians, to make progressive adaptations to the tool. The consultations will lead to a summary report for CAMH to guide their future work.
For more about AIMHI Health, see: https://aimhi.health/
The consultations were funded by the Stollery Children’s Hospital Foundation through the Women and Children’s Health Research Institute.
Part 3. Partnering with youth to co-produce harm reduction guidelines for the use of AI chatbots to support mental and emotional health: A co-produced project
We are now conducting a co-design project centering youth voices in the AI chatbot space. Over the course of a year, we will co-produce youth-oriented harm-reduction guidelines to support youth in the safe use of publicly available AI chatbots for mental and emotional health. To do so, we will bring together youth with mental health conditions and various professionals for a two-day design jam to co-produce harm-reduction guidelines that address the concerns and potential benefits of AI chatbot use. We will then test how well these new guidelines work among young people who use AI chatbots for their mental and emotional health, via the CALM study. We will use their feedback to revise and refine the guidelines. The final version of the harm-reduction guidelines will be shared with youth and youth-serving organizations across Canada.
This project was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)/Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research (SPOR).