Executive summary: Unguided self-help therapy, particularly using behavioral activation techniques delivered via apps, may be significantly more cost-effective than guided self-help for treating depression in low-resource settings.
Key points:
Meta-analyses suggest unguided self-help has about 70% the effectiveness of guided self-help for depression, with similar long-term effects.
Engagement with unguided self-help in trials is no less than half that of guided; real-world engagement is lower but not drastically so. Differences may be more due to encouragement than expertise.
Cost-effectiveness models estimate unguided self-help could be 10-20x cheaper than guided at scale, with costs potentially decreasing further due to organic growth.
Behavioral activation therapy is well-suited for unguided delivery due to its simplicity, is a key effective component of CBT, and may be less stigmatizing.
Unguided self-help is less risky to implement as it can scale faster, fail faster and cheaper, and be highly funding-absorbent. Displacement of other treatments is a concern.
Advances in AI and technology could help further close effectiveness and engagement gaps between unguided and guided self-help.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, andcontact us if you have feedback.
Executive summary: Unguided self-help therapy, particularly using behavioral activation techniques delivered via apps, may be significantly more cost-effective than guided self-help for treating depression in low-resource settings.
Key points:
Meta-analyses suggest unguided self-help has about 70% the effectiveness of guided self-help for depression, with similar long-term effects.
Engagement with unguided self-help in trials is no less than half that of guided; real-world engagement is lower but not drastically so. Differences may be more due to encouragement than expertise.
Cost-effectiveness models estimate unguided self-help could be 10-20x cheaper than guided at scale, with costs potentially decreasing further due to organic growth.
Behavioral activation therapy is well-suited for unguided delivery due to its simplicity, is a key effective component of CBT, and may be less stigmatizing.
Unguided self-help is less risky to implement as it can scale faster, fail faster and cheaper, and be highly funding-absorbent. Displacement of other treatments is a concern.
Advances in AI and technology could help further close effectiveness and engagement gaps between unguided and guided self-help.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.