Current Status Of And Future Directions For Assessing Technology Acceptance For Digital Mental Health Interventions

Current Status of and Future Directions for Assessing Technology Acceptance for Digital (Mental) Health Interventions

Recently, digital interventions have proliferated and show promising results in preventing and treating common mental health disorders, such as depression, in different settings (e.g., workplaces). Digital interventions may have advantages over face-to-face interventions (e.g., more accessible; easily customisable; real-time monitoring). However, despite efforts made by healthcare systems worldwide (e.g., apps on prescription in Germany), actual adoption is still rather low in many countries. It is essential to understand innovation acceptance in order to tailor digital interventions and to measure user technology acceptance. In this way, determinants can be identified to derive strategies to promote acceptance. Technology acceptance has been studied extensively, resulting in the development of various theoretical models (e.g., Technology Acceptance Model-TAM; Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology-UTAUT, UTAUT2). Besides several methodological strengths, technology acceptance models also have various limitations, which makes it difficult to investigate causality or to generalize findings across different contexts, populations, and cultures.

Digital Interventions in Mental Health: Current Status and Future Directions

New Directions in Forensic Psychology: Applying Neuropsychology, Biomarkers and Technology in Assessment & Intervention

New trends in research, assessment and treatment are currently visible in the forensic field in three relatively separate areas: the use of neuropsychology, biomarkers, and wearables and VR-technology in forensic mental health. These areas individually can make a valuable contribution to improving forensic assessments and treatment but combined they might even have a greater impact. For example, heart rate variability (a biomarker) can be visualized during Virtual Reality (VR) scenarios to increase patients’ insights into their physiological responses. With our topic 'New Directions in Forensic Psychology: Applying Neuropsychology, Biomarkers and Technology in Assessment and Intervention’ we hope to offer more insight into the state of scientific developments in the aforementioned areas as they relate to forensic psychology. As a result, we hope to be able to pinpoint lacking knowledge and offer suggestions for further research.