By Pooja Toshniwal PahariaMar 22 2024Reviewed by Lily Ramsey, LLM In a recent review published in npj Digital Medicine, researchers examined the current state of research into fully automated conversational agents -mediated interventions for the emotional component of mental health among young individuals.
However, fully automated CAs have limitations, such as relying primarily on adult populations and not distinguishing between young and older populations. Most reviews focus on a subcategory of conversational agents based on embodiment level. The team excluded secondary research, dissertations, conference proceedings, and commentaries describing or reporting on the general characteristics of human-conversational agent interactions or intervention studies exclusively testing the general features of the human-technology interaction using CAs.
Interventional characteristics assessed included the targeted mental wellness outcome, scope, frequency, duration, theoretical framework, or standalone intervention). The dialog system used by the CAs was predominantly machine learning and natural language processing , with some using predetermined dialog systems and interactions matched and assembled to user input dynamically.
The sample sizes ranged from eight to 234 participants primarily recruited from educational, community, and healthcare settings, with a mean age of 17 years, and 58% were female.