Mood mAPPer
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Mood mAPPer: Validation of a Mobile Phone App to track Moods and Mental States in Young Persons with ADHD
IRAS ID
178841
Contact name
Philip Asherson
Contact email
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
N/A, N/A
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 6 months, 1 days
Research summary
Children with ADHD have a 30-50% risk of developing depression by adolescence, including self-harm and suicidal behaviour. This has a devastating impact on their daily life and future outcomes. Unfortunately, clinical care for this young patient group is insufficient. Clinicians regularly overlook depression in adolescents with ADHD. Although psychotherapy is ideally suited to tackle depression in adolescents with ADHD, the delivery of this treatment is often problematic. This is because at present some therapeutic procedures are not compatible with prominent ADHD symptoms. A pertinent example is forgetfulness interfering with the self-monitoring of shifting thoughts and feelings; an essential first step in therapy.
These diagnostic and treatment drawbacks center on the same shortcoming in current clinical practice: a lack of an efficient way to track the shifts in thoughts and feelings that indicate development of depression in adolescents with ADHD. To address this need, we propose to examine the clinical usefulness of a novel mobile phone application (the ‘'Mood mAPPer") that allows young persons to track their emotional experiences.
This app will make it easier for adolescents with ADHD to monitor their thoughts and feelings throughout the day. By doing so, clinicians can get an accurate picture of their mood, which in turn will lead to a better recognition of co-occurring depression in adolescents suffering from ADHD. It will also make it easier for young persons with ADHD and depression to self-monitor their mood, target improved self-control of emotional states and thus improve treatment success.
However, before this app can be implemented in clinical care, rigorous examination of its use and usefulness is needed, including how feasible the use of the app is in teenagers with ADHD, how consistent the ratings are over time, and how well they indicate cooccurring depression. This is the main of of the proposed Mood mAPPer project.
REC name
London - Hampstead Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/LO/1019
Date of REC Opinion
16 Jun 2015
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion