Digital Mental Health
Revolutionising youth mental health care through digital technology that is engaging, ethical and evidence-based.
The Centre for Youth Mental Health's digital mental health group is part of Orygen Digital, the digital division of youth mental health organisation, Orygen. Orygen Digital harnesses the latest tools and knowledge from clinical psychology, computer science, computational technology and user experience design to develop youth mental health solutions that work.
Purpose Orygen Digital is dedicated to meaningfully and lastingly improving the lives of all young people with mental-ill health and their families. We believe that all young people and families have the right to effective mental health care, without limits. This requires new methods and ways of working that harness technology, science and creativity to transform youth mental health care as we know it. | ||
Youth and family led innovation We work alongside young people and their families to design and deliver technology-based mental health care that is loved by those who use it. | True multidisciplinary collaboration Our in-house innovation laboratory blends diverse talent from 14 different disciplines across creative, computational, clinical and research domains, to arrive at completely novel digital solutions to old problems in youth mental health care. | Digitally enhanced clinical services We partner with youth mental health services to fully merge our effective and innovative technologies, creating new models of service delivery that directly address the major limitations of current models of care. |
Browse the tabs above to find out more about the Centre for Youth Mental Health's digital mental health group.
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Social Media
Building a completely new and enriching therapy environment with social media.
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Artificial Intelligence
Using AI to augment mental health care and personalise treatment.
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Novel evidence-based therapeutic models and mediums
Using creativity and science to develop engaging online therapy that works.
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Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) and Ecological Momentary Interventions (EMI)
Delivering the right treatment at the right time with mobile mental health check-ins.
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Personal Sensing
Inferring mental health with sensor data from smartphones and other personal digital devices.
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Virtual Reality
Creating truly immersive therapeutic experiences.
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MOST
Moderated Online Social Therapy
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PRODIGY
Harnessing mobile sensing technologies to bridge the gap between therapy and real life for young people.
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Rebound
Preventing depression relapse with mindfulness-based online social therapy.
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Momentum
Promoting social recovery in young people at risk for psychosis with a novel strengths-based online social therapy.
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Entourage
Can online social therapy help young men overcome social anxiety and build strong social connections?
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Youth Online Training and Employment System (YOTES)
Bringing comprehensive employment support to more young people who need it.
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Horyzons
A world-first online social therapy for first episode psychosis.
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Affinity
Creating a safe social therapy environment for young people with thoughts of suicide.
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Kindred
A new model of care for relatives of young people with borderline personality disorder.
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Generation
Augmenting phone and web chat counseling with novel models on online therapy.
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Meridian
Online social therapy to support carers of young people with mental illness.
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Altitudes
Harnessing socially driven technology to empower families of young people with psychosis.
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Virtual Reality
A suite of virtual reality experiences that can be used to enhance treatments for youth mental health.
A unique blend of talent from the behavioural health sciences, computing science, information technology and the arts, as well as young people and families with lived knowledge and experience.
- Professor Mario Alvarez-Jimenez
Director
- Dr Simon D'Alfonso
Head of Computing
School of Computing and Information Systems
- Tamsyn Gilbertson
Team Manager
- Dr Carla McEnery
Clinical Research Manager
Research Fellows
Tech Team
Content Team
Graduate Students
Research Trial Team
- Daniela Cagliarini
Project manager
- Jordan Hinton
Research Assistant
- Sasha Malignaggi
Research assistant
Frontline Workforce
Our partners are working with us to revolutionise youth mental health care and bring our innovations into the real world.
Funding Partners
- Telstra Foundation
- Helen MacPherson Trust
- Australian Catholic University Research Fund
- National Health and Medical Research Council
- The University of Melbourne
- Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre
- Australian Research Council
- Movember Foundation
- beyond blue
- Victorian Medical Research Acceleration Fund
- the State Government of Victoria
- Telematics Trust
- headspace Australia
- HCF foundation
Research Partners
- Australian Catholic University
- University of Melbourne School of Computing and Information Systems
- University of Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences
- Royal Children's Hospital
- headspace Australia
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- McGill University, Canada
- University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
- Columbia University in the City of New York, USA
- Telethon Kids Institute, Perth
- Deakin University
- Cambridge University, United Kingdom
- University College, Dublin
Papers from the digital mental health group's projects and members are regularly published.
2020
- Rice, S., O'Bree, B., Wilson, M., McEnery, C., Lim, M., Hamilton, M., . . . Álvarez‐Jiménez, M. (2020, 5 5). Development of a graphic medicine‐enabled social media‐based intervention for youth social anxiety. Clinical Psychologist, cp.12222.
- Bailey, E., Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Robinson, J., D’Alfonso, S., Nedeljkovic, M., Davey, C., . . . Rice, S. (2020, 4 3). An Enhanced Social Networking Intervention for Young People with Active Suicidal Ideation: Safety, Feasibility and Acceptability Outcomes. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(7), 2435.
- Ludwig, K., Browne, J., Nagendra, A., Gleeson, J., D'Alfonso, S., Penn, D., & Alvarez‐Jimenez, M. (2020, 2 17). Horyzons USA: A moderated online social intervention for first episode psychosis. Early Intervention in Psychiatry, eip.12947.
2019
- D'Alfonso, S., Phillips, J., Valentine, L., Gleeson, J., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2019). Moderated Online Social Therapy: Viewpoint on the Ethics and Design Principles of a Web-Based Therapy System. JMIR Mental Health.
- McEnery, C., Lim, M., Knowles, A., Rice, S., Gleeson, J., Howell, S., . . . Alvarez‐Jimenez, M. (2019, 12 30). Social anxiety in young people with first‐episode psychosis: Pilot study of the EMBRACE moderated online social intervention. Early Intervention in Psychiatry, eip.12912.
- McEnery, C., Lim, M., Knowles, A., Rice, S., Gleeson, J., Howell, S., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2019, 8 14). Development of a Moderated Online Intervention to Treat Social Anxiety in First-Episode Psychosis. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 10.
- D'Alfonso, S., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2019). An Introduction to eOrygen. 4th Symposium on Computing and Mental Health at CHI 2019, Glasgow.
- Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Bendall, S., Koval, P., Rice, S., Cagliarini, D., Valentine, L., . . . Gleeson, J. (2019, 2). HORYZONS trial: protocol for a randomised controlled trial of a moderated online social therapy to maintain treatment effects from first-episode psychosis services. BMJ Open, 9(2), e024104.
- Lederman, R., Gleeson, J., Wadley, G., D'alfonso, S., Rice, S., Santesteban-Echarri, O., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2019, 2 21). Support for Carers of Young People with Mental Illness: Design and Trial of a Technology-Mediated Therapy. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 26(1), 1-33.
- Valentine, L., McEnery, C., D'Alfonso, S., Phillips, J., Bailey, E., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2019, 12 11). Harnessing the Potential of Social Media to Develop the Next Generation of Digital Health Treatments in Youth Mental Health. Current Treatment Options in Psychiatry, 6(4), 325-336.
2018
- D'Alfonso, S., Carpenter, N., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2018). Making the MOST out of smartphone opportunities for mental health. Proceedings of the 30th Australian Conference on Computer-Human Interaction - OzCHI '18 (pp. 577-581). New York, New York, USA: ACM Press.
- Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Gleeson, J., Bendall, S., Penn, D., Yung, A., Ryan, R., . . . Nelson, B. (2018, 12). Enhancing social functioning in young people at Ultra High Risk (UHR) for psychosis: A pilot study of a novel strengths and mindfulness-based online social therapy. Schizophrenia Research, 202, 369-377.
- Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Gleeson, J., Rice, S., Bendall, S., D'Alfonso, S., Eleftheriadis, D., . . . Nelson, B. (2018, 4 1). 4.3 ENHANCING SOCIAL FUNCTIONING AND LONG-TERM RECOVERY IN YOUNG PEOPLE WITH FIRST EPISODE PSYCHOSIS (FEP) AND YOUNG PEOPLE AT ULTRA HIGH RISK (UHR) FOR PSYCHOSIS: A NOVEL ONLINE SOCIAL THERAPY APPROACH. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 44(suppl_1), S4-S5.
- Rice, S., Gleeson, J., Davey, C., Hetrick, S., Parker, A., Lederman, R., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2018, 8). Moderated online social therapy for depression relapse prevention in young people: pilot study of a 'next generation' online intervention. Early Intervention in Psychiatry, 12(4), 613-625.
- Rice, S., Gleeson, J., Leicester, S., Bendall, S., D'Alfonso, S., Gilbertson, T., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2018, 2 22). Implementation of the Enhanced Moderated Online Social Therapy (MOST+) Model Within a National Youth E-Mental Health Service (eheadspace): Protocol for a Single Group Pilot Study for Help-Seeking Young People. JMIR Research Protocols, 7(2), e48.
2017
- D'Alfonso, S., Santesteban-Echarri, O., Rice, S., Wadley, G., Lederman, R., Miles, C., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2017, 6 2). Artificial Intelligence-Assisted Online Social Therapy for Youth Mental Health. Frontiers in Psychology, 8(JUN).
- Gleeson, J., Lederman, R., Herrman, H., Koval, P., Eleftheriadis, D., Bendall, S., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2017, 12 17). Moderated online social therapy for carers of young people recovering from first-episode psychosis: study protocol for a randomised controlled trial. Trials, 18(1), 27.
- Gleeson, J., Lederman, R., Koval, P., Wadley, G., Bendall, S., Cotton, S., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2017, 4 3). Moderated Online Social Therapy: A Model for Reducing Stress in Carers of Young People Diagnosed with Mental Health Disorders. Frontiers in Psychology, 8(MAR), 485.
- Santesteban-Echarri, O., Rice, S., Wadley, G., Lederman, R., D'Alfonso, S., Russon, P., . . . Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2017, 9). A next-generation social media-based relapse prevention intervention for youth depression: Qualitative data on user experience outcomes for social networking, safety, and clinical benefit. Internet Interventions, 9, 65-73.
2014
- Gleeson, J., Lederman, R., Wadley, G., Bendall, S., McGorry, P., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2014, 4). Safety and Privacy Outcomes From a Moderated Online Social Therapy for Young People With First-Episode Psychosis. Psychiatric Services, 65(4), 546-550.
- Lederman, R., Wadley, G., Gleeson, J., Bendall, S., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2014, 2 1). Moderated online social therapy: Designing and evaluating technology for mental health. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 21(1), 1-26.
2013
- Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Bendall, S., Lederman, R., Wadley, G., Chinnery, G., Vargas, S., . . . Gleeson, J. (2013, 1). On the HORYZON: Moderated online social therapy for long-term recovery in first episode psychosis. Schizophrenia Research, 143(1), 143-149.
- Wadley, G., Lederman, R., Gleeson, J., & Alvarez-Jimenez, M. (2013). Participatory design of an online therapy for youth mental health. Proceedings of the 25th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference on Augmentation, Application, Innovation, Collaboration - OzCHI '13 (pp. 517-526). New York, New York, USA: ACM Press.
2012
- Alvarez-Jimenez, M., & Gleeson, J. (2012, 12 4). Connecting the dots: Twenty-first century technologies to tackle twenty-first century challenges in early intervention. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 46(12), 1194-1196
- Gleeson, J., Alvarez-Jimenez, M., & Lederman, R. (2012, 7). Moderated Online Social Therapy for Recovery From Early Psychosis. Psychiatric Services, 63(7), 719-719.