Talk:Chatbots in psychotherapy

Length

The article contains 3,009 words. This is an appropriate length as it is in the range of 3000 ± 100. Each section appears to have a reasonable length; the content is generally thorough without incorporating extraneous information.

Structure

The article contains an opening paragraph that summarizes chatbots in psychotherapy. It begins by defining the topic so readers know what to expect. After reading only the opening paragraph, I understand the goals of chatbot technology in therapy, how it’s related to artificial intelligence, and that there exist some ethical concerns with this new technology.

The body of the article is well-organized. However, I question the relevance of the “Design and Development” section because this seems more related to the topic of artificial intelligence than the specific topic of chatbots in psychotherapy. It provides context, but it is slightly off topic. The “Types of Chatbots” section and subsections are very well-organized; this section gives the reader a broad view of the topic and it greatly increases my understanding. Putting this section before the ethical section is good because in order to understand the ethics, you need to understand what the article is talking about.

Looking at the References section, all references appear to be reliable. However, there are a couple places throughout the article that I feel references are missing:

• I noticed a lack of references at the end of the “History” section (last paragraph and last half of 2nd to last paragraph).
• There are no references to reliable sources in the “Natural Language Processing” section
• There are few references in the “woebot” section
• There are no references under “conversational agents”
• Under “Data collection and privacy”, there isn’t a reference for the claims made in the 2nd paragraph

Clarity

The article is clear. The article explained what Chatbots in psychotherapy is, the history, types of psychotherapy chatbots, and finally the ethical implications of these. The article clearly lays out 4 ethical debates regarding psychotherapy chatbots, and thoroughly describes what they are, and what their effects are. This gives the reader an understanding of what the issues are, as well as why they are important.

Objective Reporting

In the article, the author does not state their own personal opinions, which is a good thing. In the ethics section, I noticed that all subsections appear to be arguing against the use of chatbots in psychotherapy. Remember that it is important to include all relevant positions when discussing controversial issues. In general, the ethics section of the article seems biased against chatbots in psychotherapy.

I would suggest that the author does some research on the potential benefits of chatbots in psychotherapy. For example, used in the right way (and perhaps not overextended to the same level as an actual therapist), it may be the case that chatbots in psychotherapy are beneficial to people. Would it be ethical to deny people these mental health benefits (if they exist)?

Overall, the article is well-written and comprehensive.