Join the Cyber Policy Center for Fears, Facts, and the Future: Mental Health and the Rights of Digital Natives , a conversation with Nick Allen, moderated by Jeff Hancock, co director of the Stanford Cyber Policy Center. This session is part of the Fall Seminar Series, a series spanning October through December, hosted at the Cyber Policy Center. Sessions are in-person and virtual, with in-person attendance offered to Stanford affiliates only. Lunch is provided for in-person attendance and registration is required.

Digital technologies have been proposed to be both the cause and the cure for our epidemic of mental ill health, especially amongst youth. Not surprisingly, extreme claims on both sides of the issue often lack evidence or do not stand up to scrutiny. In this talk I will explore what we know about the harms, benefits, and potential of digital technology with respect to mental health, and how we can balance the participatory and protective rights of young people in policy solutions. I will also explore how the supply and demand dynamics of the mental health field (i.e., high demand and limited supply) influences the viable business models, and how these in turn facilitate (or inhibit) certain outcomes. Finally, I will consider how education, regulation, and product design can maximize the benefits and minimize the risks of new technologies for mental health. 

About the Speaker

Nick Allen is the Ann Swindells Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Oregon, and the co-founder and CEO of Ksana Health Inc. His research work has focused on understanding risk factors for adolescent onset mental health disorders and using these insights to develop innovative approaches to prevention and early intervention. He is the Director of the Center for Digital Mental Health, where his group holds multiple NIH funded grants that use mobile and wearable technology to monitor health outcomes including suicide, depression, and bipolar disorder. The ultimate aim of these technologies is to develop a new generation of “just-in-time” behavioral interventions for prevention and treatment of mental health problems.