Archive for November, 2008

With the proliferation of social networks and most recently, the budding of new niche social networks geared toward specific groups, therapists are finding many places to connect and discuss! The Online Therapy Institute features discussion groups at Linkedin, Links for Shrinks and Facebook. We encourage open discussion of all issues related to technology and mental health from marketing one’s private practice on the web to actually conducting online therapy. But therapists should take caution when discussing client cases on such networks. While some networks may be password protected, links can sometimes be copied and pasted from most standard discussion boards and forums leaving practitioners and their clients vulnerable. The Online Therapy Institute provides a secure and encrypted member forum that is HIPAA compliant (important to therapists in the United States). The forum offers chat and discussion board features that give the therapist a confidential place to talk about cases.

Even when therapists “blind the record” removing all identifying information, client identity can sometimes be discovered if by simply knowing the location of the therapist through a forum or email tagline. If the therapist practices in a rural area, it may not be difficult to connect the dots. While it is enticing to enter into clinical discussions with peer professionals, counsellors and therapists should make sure discussions are completely confidential.

DeeAnna

Well, the story gets more bizarre… the SL/RL divorce couple have refused to speak to the press who were door-stepping them in Cornwall, so a couple of enterprising journalists doorstepped them in Second Life and they opened up immediately!  Disinhibition in action, my friends!

Read the full story at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/nov/15/secondlife-digitalmedia

Kate

Well – *this* is *such* a confusing story I had to read it several times to work out what was going on…  Fact and Fiction collide now a British couple are divorcing after the husbands inworld affair over in Second Life.  They met in a chatroom, then she moved to Cornwall to be with him.  Then one day she woke up to witness him having cybersex with a prostitute via his computer.  They got divorced in SL but remained married in RL, but she set up a virtual honeytrap in which he passed with flying colours, so they remarried in SL and sunsequently got married in RL.  After discovering a second affair in SL, she divorced him inworld and has now filed for divorce in RL…

At least I *think* that’s what happened…

Read the full story at : http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/nov/15/secondlife-digitalmedia

Kate

I’ve just been made aware of a project going on in Dundee by someone at the University of Abertay, it’s launching today and I’m a bit gutted I can’t make it with such short notice.

However, it’s all about “developing emotionally engaging procedural character animations. The research will be underpinned by a comparative study of psychologically derived data relating to the expression and interpretation of emotion, with film based acted and animated performances.”

All sounds very exciting!  Check it out at http://emotionalavatars.vox.com/library/post/emotional-avatars-an-art-led-research-project.html

Kate 

Interesting article in The Guardian’s education supplement this week on SL – a conference was set up called Education Without Boundaries.  The journalist states that the informal networking sessions were the most useful part of it – which kinda mirrors RL conferences!  Something else that made me smile was the fact that the virtual conference centre decor was the “naff, over-elaborate kind you get in conference hotels” (see pic below)- and was bizarrely familiar apart from turning around to see another delegate with a snake around his neck…

Read the full story at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/mortarboard/2008/nov/11/highereducation-secondlife

 

What particularly interests me on this story – as co-author of several editions of the UK Guidelines for Online work – is that the executive director of the Canadian Psychological Association (Karen Cohen) agrees online therapy could be beneficial.  She states that her association is drafting guidelines for online counselling as it grapples with broad questions, and I’m in contact with her as expert in the field to see if OTI can be of help )

Kate

Read the full story at :

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5id6Zw9EwcabyQ0iUCczof1PvjptA

I am wondering if any of you have a sense of how long an email response should be? If a client emails a long and heartfelt story outlining questions and concerns, how does a therapist determine how long the response should be? Should the therapist match the length of the client’s email in his or her reply? Should the therapist’s email be longer?

When I send someone a lengthy email (and I can be longwinded) I tend to want an answer that “works”. Granted the email may not have anything to do with psychotherapy, cyberpsychology or any other mental health issue. It may be a complaint to a major department store about my dissatisfaction with a service or a product. But what I look for in a reply is an answer.

Many online therapists tend to think that a lengthy response is the best response. I like to think in terms of giving the best answer which may be long or short. A lengthy response does not necessarily indicate a substantial response. What say all the e-therapists out there? How about those of you that have sought email therapy? What is your preference or expectation?

DeeAnna