Introducing DPT Lab
The road to digital psychotherapy
Digital psychotherapy (DPT lab) is where computer scientists and clinical psychologists team up to combine theories and expertise.
The lab develops and evaluates new technologies in order to improve the effects as well as the accessibility of evidence-based psychotherapeutic interventions.
Psychotherapy
People can struggle with challenges like coping with unfortunate events, quitting smoking, having a better lifestyle, improving relationships or dealing with a mental disorder. The challenges end up weakening the individual and worsening the overall content and satisfaction. Psychotherapy helps to raise awareness towards thoughts and behavioral patterns and to adjust them by ensuring conditions allowing trust, openness, neutrality and support.
Computer science
A computer scientist’s role is the creation, design, and implementation of software and hardware systems for the advancement of technology and innovation.
The collaboration
Computer scientists interested in psychology at the HumanTech institute joined forces with clinical psychotherapists at the University of Fribourg to create Digital Psychotherapy Lab, a group who’s mission is to develop and evaluate innovative therapeutic tools using novel technologies, enabling therapists to provide affordable and flexible state-of-the-art care to a larger number of affected persons. The group’s developments are rooted in fundamental research, comprehensively examining the benefits and difficulties in the use of each new therapeutic approach.
Areas of expertise
Virtual Reality
Virtual Reality, where users can immerse themselves into reactive artificial environments, have been employed in the treatment of specific phobias for more than two decades, but treatment programs targeting several other mental disorders are only now coming within reach. A key benefit of employing this technology is to allow patients to repeatedly experience problematic situations along the treatment process, relying on well-established therapeutical principles while expanding the possibilities for corrective experiences.
Some projects:
- VR for fear of spiders and fear of heights therapy
The fear of spiders (arachnophobia) and fear of heights (acrophobia) belong to the group of specific phobias. This term designates an irrational fear felt by the individual. It’s a highly frequent type of phobia that can cause severe troubles to affected people, as they will seek to avoid at all costs any contact with the concerned situation.
A way to overcome these phobias is called exposure therapy. This technique consists in letting the patient confront his fear, progressively so that fear decreases as the exposure increases.
This method may offer many challenging requirements for the therapist (e.g.: possessing a set of spiders, taking the patient to high places, etc.). A virtual reality app allows its user to be confronted with a spider whose appearance and size can vary, or to take an elevator in the middle of a city. The therapist always has the control of the spider (size, movements, appearance…) or of the altitude and sees the patient’s point of view in real time.
Chatbots
A chatbot is an artificial intelligence agent that can have a conversation with a user using messaging applications, websites, or through a phone call.
Some projects:
Mobile apps
Digital media such as a mobile phone application have the potential to complement and improve existing psychotherapeutic services and to close existing gaps in healthcare services. The current COVID-19 pandemic also highlights the need to expand existing digital care services.
Some projects:
Websites
The advantage of online interventions (website, app) is that they can be used anonymously, independent of time and location on a smartphone, tablet or laptop. They are also less expensive. In this way, access to treatment is also made possible for socio-culturally disadvantaged or isolated patients.
Some projects:
Many more projects and collaborations to come!
DPT Lab will be collaborating with Empathic Labs and using their blog to publish future projects.
Feel free to contact any of the lab’s members to discuss, collaborate or suggest ideas by using the following url: https://digitalpsychotherapylab.ch/team/
Fouad
