Abstract
Adolescents with depression who participate in behavioral activation therapy may find it hard to be motivated to perform tasks at home that their therapists recommend. We describe the initial design and usability evaluation of a home device (“PlantBot”) that could be used to remind young adults with depression at home of their behavioral activation therapy-related tasks. The prototype features electronics in a two-layer base, with a fake plant on top and supported using the Amazon Echo voice agent. We use an online panel study to evaluate the usability of our system with youth with past depression (N= 30). Initial findings highlight the device’s usability, potential benefit, and attractiveness of the plant component, as well as multiple improvements to be made.
Highlights
Depression is a serious mental health issue that affects adolescents and adults globally
From the second user test, we can conclude that the interaction with both Alexa and the PlantBot was greatly improved with the second prototype
The user test seemed to show that the overall concept and idea behind PlantBot could be helpful— in particular, the interaction of displaying lights to signal to the user to speak with Alexa about a task
Summary
Depression is a serious mental health issue that affects adolescents and adults globally. Most past technologies for depression involve mobile/web applications with different use cases, such as helping track and present analytics about a user’s mood, offering articles on depression and therapy, using data collection to evaluate if professional intervention is necessary, or attempting to counter negative emotions by using meditation (Table 1). 2.1.1 Mobile/Web Applications for Adolescents and Young Adults. Websites, and a chatbot have been developed for adolescents and young adults with depression. The app performs a “root cause analysis” and helps users identify positive/negative influences in their lives. It lets users set personal goals and tracks the progress of these goals. It claims to be focused on various groups including teenagers or students (ages 13 to 20), professional adults (ages 20 to 50), retired persons (age 50+), and others
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