About artificial intelligence and digital mental health, with psychologist Ioana Podina, associate professor at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of UB

Assoc. prof. Ioana Podina, PhD, teaching staff at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, invites us, in a new episode of the UB Dose of Science series, to a provocative discussion on artificial intelligence and its use in the assessment of mental health and in the prevention of mental illnesses.

Episode number 10 of the UB Dose of Science series can be accessed with just one click below.

Starting from the premise that the development of the GPT3 model, or ChatGPT, represents a turning point for artificial intelligence, in that it begins to understand human language like a human, Ioana Podina’s presentation addresses the various ways in which mental health specialists can use this fact in their favor.

Thus, based on the results obtained within the aiCARE project, mainly dedicated to determining the mental health status of cancer survivors, assoc. prof. Ioana Podina, PhD, offers us an applied and realistic discussion on the opportunities and limits of using artificial intelligence in determining the state of mental health on a broader level.

As the guest of this episode shows, in digital mental health, chatbots have a number of important implications: they can educate on mental health, they can be an adjunct to psychological counseling, and they can contribute to health screening. As such, if as an adjunct to psychological counseling, there are still many steps to take, there is significant potential for automation in mental health assessment.

However, as shown by Ioana Podina in many cases, chatbots cannot replace a clinical diagnosis made by a specialist but can only indicate the need to request the help of a psychologist, psychotherapist or psychiatrist.

And this is all the more necessary since, according to the latest statistics of the World Health Organization, one in eight people currently suffers from a mental health disorder, usually anxiety or depression. And this, as Ioana Podina says, also happens due to the fact that, as a rule, people go to a psychologist only when the emotional discomfort becomes too intense. As a result, access to various mental health self-screening modalities would allow the user to know their health status and quick them to take steps to prevent the exacerbation of mental health issues.

To exemplify this phenomenon, the guest uses the experience of the aiCARE project, in which the research team developed and tested a conversational therapeutic agent for anxiety and depression, namely the aiCARE chatbot. It started out as aimed at cancer survivors because around 50% of them are left with mental health consequences such as depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress and fear of disease recurrence.

Based on this type of applicability, the researchers realized that the questions set for this mental health assessment chatbot can be asked of anyone who wants to have such a screening.

Ioana Podina talks to us about the methods and results of the aiCARE project and the use of the aiCARE chatbot in the assessment of mental health, as well as the implications of the use of artificial intelligence on a wider level in the assessment of mental health and the prevention of various mental illnesses in the 10^th episode of the UB Dose of Science.

More information on the aiCARE project, coordinated by Ioana Podina, can be accessed here.

Ioana Podina is a PhD associate professor at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences and coordinator of the Laboratory of Clinical Cognitive Sciences. She is a psychologist and psychotherapist internationally certified by the Albert Ellis Institute (New York, USA) in cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy, respectively nationally certified by the Romanian College of Psychologists.

She is the president of the research committee of the prestigious international psychotherapy association Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration (SEPI) and representative in Romania of the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR). She is qualified as a doctoral coordinator.

Her main research interests are in the development of technology-assisted psychological interventions, the study of socio-economic decisions and the study of morality, and her central concern is the promotion of mental health and well-being in both clinical health as well as in public and organizational milieus. More details on Ioana Podina’s professional and academic career are available here and here.

The clip was filmed at the University of Bucharest’s Learning Center.

Launched in October 2021, the UB Dose of Science is a project that proposes a focused and dynamic way to communicate scientific information in an attractive, lively and expressive format, establishing a platform for dialogue with the public interested in science.

Initiated within the Science Communication Program, launched by the University of Bucharest in 2018, the UB Dose of Science is aimed at the public and encourages the connection between the academic and non-academic milieus, based on current and interesting topics.

The guests of this series, intended to represent a synthetic and engaging way of communicating the various fields of science, are mainly professors and researchers from the academic community of the University of Bucharest.

The materials in the UB Dose of Science include short and dynamic presentations of topics relevant to contemporary society: pollution, climate change, education, digitalization, significant research contributions and others. Thus, in addition to the fundamental dimension of communicating scientifically validated information, the UB Dose of Science also proposes an important component of social responsibility, reconfirming the role and mission of the University of Bucharest within society and contributing to the awareness of acute problems of today’s world and to the promotion of possible solutions to these problems.