Carter Funkhouser, Ph.D.

Fellow In Child & Adolescent Depression

Project Details

PROJECT SUMMARY

Rates of depression in adolescence are surging, and most adolescents with depression do not receive any treatment because they do not want it or cannot access it. Delivering interventions through the internet is a promising way to expand treatment access, and web-based interventions are appealing to many adolescents, accessible, scalable, and effective. However, web-based interventions generally have low utilization and impact because they are too time-consuming and effortful for most users. To address these key limitations, this project will develop, refine, and evaluate a brief web-based single-session intervention optimized for deployment on a mental health screening website where many depressed adolescents seek early support. The intervention will target interpersonal problems (e.g., peer conflicts, loneliness) – core contributors to adolescent depression – by teaching skills from interpersonal psychotherapy for adolescents (IPT-A), a gold standard treatment for adolescent depression.