Presentation 2

My presentation will be this Saturday at one of the big convention hotels half an hour away.  I will give my talk in the middle of the afternoon, when most people will be tired and sick of being there. But they have to stay to the end to get their CEUs.

I'd better be entertaining.

The point of my talk is to try to get Psychologists to realize that it is time they moved into the 21st Century.  A great deal of marvelous and exciting scientific work has been done since the turn of the century.  A lot of it is very relevant to Psychology, but not in Psychology.  It has been done in the fields of genetics, brains science, cognitive science, neurology, and even anthropology and architecture.  In addition there have been great leaps forward in computer technology, the collecting of Big Data and using it to find patterns.

This is already being done by companies such as Ginger io and Lyra, among others.

In preparation for my talk I've been bringing up these developments to many of the therapists I know.  They look at me kind of stunned.

What about confidentiality?
What about the centrality of the patient/therapist relationship? They wonder.

To which I answer :

What about the school shootings?  What about the rising suicide rate?  What about bullying?  What about domestic violence?  What about the rise in opioid use and over-doses?

How are mental health professionals really helping to solve these major problems?

What if a lot of these things could be found and prevented with the use of Big Data and computer discovered algorithms?

What's wrong with that?

Can Big Brother really be like a good Big Brother, and be helpful?
What if it is your doctor's office and not the government?

Trust?

Too late.  It's already here.