Psychology

APA: With digital mental health going mainstream, will/ should psychologists be able to “prescribe” interventions?

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Men­tal health, meet ven­ture cap­i­tal (APA):

Until recent­ly, men­tal health was a rel­a­tive blip on the radar of ven­ture cap­i­tal­ists. But over the past few years, and par­tic­u­lar­ly since the onset of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, pri­vate investors have made a dra­mat­ic run for this space, pour­ing $3.1 bil­lion into men­tal health ven­tures by the third quar­ter of 2021 alone, accord­ing to Rock Health, a seed fund that sup­ports star­tups work­ing in dig­i­tal health. That rep­re­sents a third of all dig­i­tal health fund­ing for 2021, more than 7 times the amount of fund­ing placed in such ven­tures in 2015. [Read more…] about APA: With dig­i­tal men­tal health going main­stream, will/ should psy­chol­o­gists be able to “pre­scribe” interventions?

Study: Depression affects visual perception … making it more accurate

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The bright­ness of Fig­ures A and B is exact­ly the same, but they are per­ceived dif­fer­ent­ly due to a dif­fer­ence in the back­ground. This illu­sion was per­ceived sim­i­lar­ly by the patients and healthy con­trol sub­jects. The con­trast of Fig­ures C and D is exact­ly the same as well, but the per­cep­tion of this illu­sion was weak­er among the depressed patients than the con­trol sub­jects. (Salmela et al, J. Psy­chi­a­try Neu­rosci, 2021)

Depres­sion affects visu­al per­cep­tion (press release by Uni­ver­si­ty of Helsinki):

Researchers spe­cialised in psy­chi­a­try and psy­chol­o­gy at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Helsin­ki inves­ti­gat­ed the effects of depres­sion on visu­al per­cep­tion. The study con­firmed that the pro­cess­ing of visu­al infor­ma­tion is altered in depressed peo­ple, a phe­nom­e­non most like­ly linked with the pro­cess­ing of infor­ma­tion in the cere­bral cor­tex. [Read more…] about Study: Depres­sion affects visu­al per­cep­tion … mak­ing it more accurate

Virtual-reality gaming + affordable biofeedback = Anxiety therapy for all?

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Videogame Tech­nol­o­gy Could Bring Biofeed­back Ther­a­py to the Liv­ing Room (The Wall Street Journal):

For decades, use of biofeed­back to help suf­fer­ers of anx­i­ety, among oth­er psy­cho­log­i­cal con­di­tions, has large­ly been lim­it­ed to clin­i­cal set­tings with expensive—and some­what tedious—medical equip­ment. Now, with an assist from devel­op­ers of vir­tu­al-real­i­ty games, effec­tive ther­a­peu­tic biofeed­back is becom­ing more afford­able, acces­si­ble and engaging.

Tests of a new gen­er­a­tion of prod­ucts that com­bine advances in wear­able bio­met­ric sen­sors with the immersive—and fun—qualities of vir­tu­al-real­i­ty gam­ing have increas­ing­ly demon­strat­ed effec­tive­ness in help­ing anx­ious sub­jects achieve states of calm, among oth­er ther­a­peu­tic uses.

[Read more…] about Vir­tu­al-real­i­ty gam­ing + afford­able biofeed­back = Anx­i­ety ther­a­py for all?

Study finds clear–yet surprisingly different–benefits in 3 types of meditation-based mental training

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As cit­i­zens of the 21st cen­tu­ry, we face many prob­lems that come with an indus­tri­al­ized and glob­al­ized world. I’m not a lawyer or a politi­cian, but a psy­chol­o­gist and neu­ro­sci­en­tist. So research on how to train help­ful men­tal and social capac­i­ties is my way to con­tribute to a more healthy, com­mu­nal, and coop­er­a­tive civilization.

For the past five years, that research has tak­en the form of the ReSource Project, one of the longest and most com­pre­hen­sive stud­ies on the effects of med­i­ta­tion-based men­tal train­ing to date. Lots of research treats the con­cept of med­i­ta­tion as a sin­gle prac­tice, when in fact med­i­ta­tion encom­pass­es a diver­si­ty of men­tal prac­tices that train dif­fer­ent skills and dif­fer­ent parts of the brain. Our goal was to study the spe­cif­ic effects of [Read more…] about Study finds clear–yet sur­pris­ing­ly different–benefits in 3 types of med­i­ta­tion-based men­tal training

Study finds the limits of putting oneself in another’s shoes (instead, ask and listen)

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I still remem­ber the time I tried to com­fort one of my best friends when her father died. Because I’d lost my own par­ents years before, I thought I under­stood her pain. But, when I offered sym­pa­thy, she balked. Her father’s death had been tran­scen­dent, filled with love and fam­i­ly con­nec­tion. She didn’t feel pain; she felt at peace. [Read more…] about Study finds the lim­its of putting one­self in another’s shoes (instead, ask and listen)

May 6th, New York City: Anticipating and Shaping the Neuropsychology of the Future

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Heads-up about an upcom­ing joint meet­ing by the New York Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy Group and the Psy­chol­o­gy Sec­tion of the New York Acad­e­my of Sciences.

  • What: Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy of the future and how we can pre­pare for it today
  • When: Sat­ur­day May 6th, 2017, 10 am – 1 pm
  • Where: Podell Audi­to­ri­um in Bern­stein Pavil­ion, Mount Sinai Beth Israel 10 Nathan D Perl­man Place NY, NY 10003

The Focus

Please join promi­nent neu­ropsy­chol­o­gists and indus­try lead­ers to explore the future of neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy and how you can har­ness recent find­ings and tech­nolo­gies to pre­pare for [Read more…] about May 6th, New York City: Antic­i­pat­ing and Shap­ing the Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy of the Future