Conference Information
Date
19-21 June 2024
Location/venue
Ulster University, Derry-Londonderry campus, Northland Road, Derry-Londonderry
Chairs
- Dr Edel Ennis
- Dr Patrick McAllister
- Dr Colin Gorman
Programme Chairs
- Prof. Maurice Mulvenna
- Prof. Raymond Bond
- Prof. Malachy O'Neill
Postgraduate Research Chair
- Dr Kyle Boyd
Local Organisation Chairs
- Gillian Cameron
- Courtney Potts
Key dates:
- Call for abstracts: 1 October 2023
- Abstract submission:
1 March 202415 March 2024 - Abstract notification: 15 April 2024
- Conference: 19-21 June 2024
- Special issue invitation: TBC
- Special issue submission: TBC
Register for the Conference
For queries, please contact the conference chairs at Ulster University: Dr Patrick McAllister (p.mcallister@ulster.ac.uk), Dr Edel Ennis (e.ennis@ulster.ac.uk), Dr Colin Gorman (c.gorman@ulster.ac.uk)
Conference Locations
Conference Summary
Mental ill health is prevalent, and citizens need more support to prevent mental ill health as well as supporting their treatment and management of their mental health and wellbeing. With traditional services being under pressure, there is a need for more research to investigate the use of digital technologies to support the mental health and wellbeing of people.
However, we must also bear in mind that the implementation of digital technologies cannot solve all our problems. Nevertheless, digital technologies often come with benefits such as being somewhat sustainable, ubiquitous and being accessible 24/7. This conference is looking to attract novel work involving digital mental health interventions, e.g. mental healthcare apps, chatbots, web apps, wearables, sensors, and virtual or augmented reality tools to support a person’s mental health and wellbeing.
We also want to attract data science, machine learning and AI research that is applied to the mental health domain - especially given the wealth of real-world mental health data that is available, which can provide new knowledge discoveries and insights.
The conference will feature keynotes and talks from leading academic researchers and service providers. There will be conference proceedings and a likely special issue in a Journal. We hope to see you in Derry~Londonderry.
Keynote Speakers
Abstract submission (300-500 words)
Authors of accepted abstracts are required to register for the conference and to present their work at the conference. Abstracts will be peer reviewed and accepted abstracts will appear online in the conference proceedings.
Atlantic Futures
This conference is supported by Atlantic Futures research stream on Digital mental health support for young people. The Atlantic Futures Project is a partnership between Atlantic Technological University, Ulster University, University of Galway and University of Limerick, funded by the HEA North South Research Programme.
This conference is also sponsored by the HSC R&D office in Northern Ireland.
Special Issue Journals
Nature Partner Journals
As part of the conference, we will also be supporting Journal paper submissions to a special 'AI in Mental Health' paper collection which will be published in a Nature Partner Journal (npj Digital Medicine or npj Mental Health Research).
npj Digital Medicine is an online open-access journal dedicated to publishing high quality peer-reviewed research in all aspects of digital medicine including the clinical implementation of digital and mobile technologies, virtual healthcare, data analytic methodologies and innovative sensor development to provide the necessary data and longitudinal monitoring to best inform the broadest medical community. The journal aims to guide innovation and the transformation of health and healthcare through the incorporation of novel digital and mobile technologies.
By choosing to publish your work in npj Digital Medicine, you will benefit from:
- The visibility of publishing your work in the #1 ranking journal in the ‘Healthcare sciences and services’ category of Clarivate’s Web of Science
- Engagement with an expert Editorial Team who care about your success
- Personalized responses from our Editors and dedicated in-house team
- Fair and consistent editorial decisions
- Timely peer review (more about our metrics)
Please contact npjdigitalmed@nature.com with any questions about the journal.
Journal of Behaviour & Information Technology
We have secured a special issue on digital mental health and wellbeing in the Journal of Behaviour & Information Technology (Impact Factor = 3.320 [2021]). We will invite and encourage authors to submit their best work to this Journal.
Conference programme committee
- Prof. Siobhan O'Neill, Ulster University
- Gillian Cameron, Inspire Wellbeing
- Kate Turley, Chroma Lighting
- Dr Jorge Martinez Carracedo, Ulster University
- Philip Donaghy, Ulster University
- Courtney Potts, Ulster University
- Dr Kyle Boyd, Ulster University
- Prof. Raymond Bond, Ulster University
- Dr Edel Ennis, Ulster University
- Prof. Maurice Mulvenna, Ulster University
- Prof. Huiru Zheng, Ulster University
- Prof. Luke Chen, Ulster University
- Prof. Mike McTear, Ulster University
- Orla McDevitt-Petrovic, Ulster University
- Grainne McAnee, Ulster University
- Prof. Zoraida Callejas, University of Granada
- Dr Lu Bai, Queen's University Belfast
- Dr Jun Liu, Queen's University Belfast
- Prof. Anna Esposito, Università della Campania
- Prof. Gennaro Cordasco, Università degli Studi della Campania
- Dr Matthias Kraus, University of Augsburg
- Dr Margaret McLafferty, Ulster University
- Dr Elaine Murray, Ulster University
- Jonathan Smyth, Action Mental Health
- Gavin McConvey, Action Mental Health
- Dr Maria Wolters, University of Edinburgh
- Dr Anne Moorhead, Ulster University
- Dr Kristel Miller, Ulster University
- Dr Andrea Bickerdike, Munster Technological University
- Dr Edward Coughlan, Munster Technological University
- Dr Con Burns, Munster Technological University
- Prof Sinéad McGilloway, Maynooth University
- Dr Liadh Kelly, Maynooth University
- Paul Best, Queen's University Belfast
Topics
Topics of interest (not exhaustive):
- Digital mental health interventions
- Health apps, web apps, and software in mental health
- Data science, analytics, and machine learning in mental health
- Speech analytics, Natural Language Processing (NLP) and smart speaker applications for mental health
- Conversational user interfaces and chatbots for mental health
- Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications in mental health
- Web technologies in mental health
- Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) applications in mental health
- Digital Transformation of mental health services
- Digital mental health service co-design and modelling
- Sensors and wearable technologies in mental health
- Affective computing and positive computing
- Databases and datasets in mental health
- Cyber-psychology and digital wellbeing
- Digital mental health care models
- Large Language Models (LLMs) in mental health
- Digital citizenship in mental health
- Ethics in digital mental health
- Digital mental health employee wellbeing
- Co-production and co-creation of digital mental health services
- Digital mental health as adjunctive therapy
- Digital mental health and social prescriptions
- Addressing engagement and retention in digital mental health services
- Using gamification approaches in digital mental health interventions
- Evidence-based approaches for mental health services
- Developing policy and practice around digital mental health interventions
- Regulation, compliance, quality assurance and standards in digital mental health service design
- Design and evaluation of digitally supported content, therapies and interventions
- Digital mental health interventions for marginalised groups
- Digital storytelling, design fictions, interaction design, graphic design for mental health service co-creation
Registration
Registration fee will cover coffee breaks and lunches and an evening conference dinner/meal.
Given HSC have also sponsored this event, HSC/NHS staff can attend free of charge. Please email Dr Edel Ennis if you are HSC/NHS staff to attend the talks. Note that this does not include catering/evening meal. Hence, if you wish to avail of catering/evening meal, then please register using the link.
Key dates:
- Call for abstracts: 1 October 2023
- Abstract submission: 1 March 2024
- Abstract notification: 1 April 2024
- Conference: 19-21 June 2024
- Special issue invitation: TBC
- Special issue submission: TBC
2023 Digital Mental Health and Wellbeing Conference
Check out details from our previous conference, which featured keynotes and talks from leading academic researchers and service providers.