Project Title: Gieia: The Study of an Algorithmic App-Based Approach to Teens’ Mental Wellness Assessment
BASIS Advisor: Ms.Das
Internship Location: Massachusetts General Hospital
Onsite Mentor: Dr. Areej El Jawahri
The standard mental wellness assessment for teens currently only occurs once a year in a pediatrician’s office and thus does not provide an accurate perspective on teens’ constantly fluctuating mental wellness. This research is determining whether the standard assessment for mental health and substance use may be conducted algorithmically through a mobile app as well as the feasibility and acceptability of utilizing this method to assess mental wellness among teens. To determine whether the standard mental wellness assessment may be conducted algorithmically, I am validating the algorithms within Gieia, a teens’ mobile mental wellness assessment app that I developed, through a two-part process. My mentor is assessing and diagnosing data sets for the validated screening tools within Gieia based on each screening tool’s corresponding scoring guide. Next, I am inputting these data sets into Gieia’s algorithms and checking whether my mentor’s manual diagnoses match Gieia’s diagnoses. Secondly, I am conducting market research with a cohort of teen colleagues who are utilizing Gieia and providing feedback through a qualitative interview. The interview addresses teens’ perception of the acceptability, accessibility, and content of Gieia; challenges utilizing Gieia; and suggested modifications to Gieia to promote teens’ engagement. These results can validate that teens may utilize Gieia to assess mental wellness consistently thus providing a more complete perspective on teens’ mental wellness and leading to a more accurate diagnosis. Furthermore, these results inform future modifications to Gieia to ensure that this tool promotes the accessibility of mental wellness assessment and resources for teens.
My Posts
Concluding My Research
Last Wednesday, I presented the research I conducted over the past two and a half months to the Senior Project Committee, my teachers, and my family. However, my work does not stop here: this research is a gateway for the development of the next iteration of my app, Gieia. Thus, this presentation may have been […]
Week 10: Creating my final presentation!
This week I returned to my Senior Project Defense Presentation and modified it to create my Senior Project Final Presentation. Upon returning to my defense presentation, it was quite shocking for me to contemplate that the research which I had laid out in this presentation was now complete! I began by outlining the aspects of […]
Week 9: Creating my final report!
This week I compiled the final report for my research! I began the week by reviewing my document of qualitative user research findings and compiling findings which were thematically associated. Once all findings were grouped within their associated themes, I reviewed the document once more and highlighted all findings which were supported by a majority […]
Week 8: Finishing Analyzing User Research Interview Transcripts!
This week I finished analyzing the user research interview transcripts. Unfortunately, this process was quite a tedious one as I sought to note every aspect of teen stakeholders’ feedback. This perhaps exorbitant attention to detail unfortunately also means that many of the aspects of teen stakeholders’ feedback which I noted overlap thematically yet were noted […]
Week 7: Analyzing User Research Interview Transcripts
This week I began analyzing the user research interview transcripts and organizing the findings from the user research. First, I reviewed each teen stakeholder’s transcript and inputted the answers selected (of the three answer choices provided) for each interview question into the spreadsheet I previously created. Next week I will create charts that demonstrate which […]
Week 6: Transcribing User Research Interviews With Teen Stakeholders
This week I worked on transcribing the user research interviews which I conducted with teen stakeholders. Though transcribing these interviews was more time-consuming than I had initially anticipated, it was extremely rewarding as I was able to not only hear but also ruminate upon the feedback that I received. Though I mentioned in my previous […]
Week 5: Conducting user research interviews with teen stakeholders
This week I conducted Gieia’s user research interviews with twelve teen stakeholders. I had initially intended to conduct these interviews with sixteen teen stakeholders, but throughout the two week user research period two teens were unable to access the app due to older IOS models and two teens were unresponsive. Upon conducting these interviews, I […]
Week 4: Revising my qualitative interview guide and preparing for the interviews
At the beginning of the week, my mentor Dr. El-Jawahri provided feedback to my qualitative interview guide. Once I completed the prescribed revisions, I sent the interview guide back to my mentor for final approval. Now with my mentor’s approval, I look forward to utilizing it next week while conducting qualitative interviews with teen stakeholders. […]
Week 3: Constructing a qualitative interview guide for market and user research
This week I moved on to the next phase of my research: validating the feasibility and acceptability of utilizing a mobile app as a means of assessing teens’ mental wellness. On Monday, the process began with a group of sixteen teen stakeholders using Gieia at least three times for the next two weeks. These teen […]
Week 2: Modifying Gieia’s PHQ-9 scoring to validate Gieia’s accurate assessment of teens’ mental wellness
This week I worked on modifying Gieia’s PHQ-9 scoring based on the contrast that I previously noted between the manually-computed scores and the Gieia-produced scores. I began by comparing the manual PHQ-9 scoring guide to Gieia’s algorithm. However, I found that the logic of the scoring guide and Gieia’s algorithm were identical. As a result, […]
Week 1: Creating and diagnosing screening tool datasets and inputting them to Gieia
This week, my overall goal was to ensure that Gieia’s algorithms are scoring the PHQ-9 (assessing mental health) and AUDIT (assessing substance use) screening tools accurately. In order to ensure this, I sought to confirm that the final diagnoses obtained based on Gieia’s algorithms were consistent with the diagnoses obtained with the manual scoring guides […]
Week 0: Introducing An App-Based Approach To Teens’ Mental Wellness Assessment
My name is Kamie Aran, and I am fascinated by the intersection of health and technology. I am particularly interested in learning how wielding computer science can promote healthcare’s accessibility and possibilities. My passion for computer science began in the sixth grade as I saw the opportunities formed by computer science’s infinite applications through a […]