Personalizing Mental Health: A Feasibility Study of a Mobile Behavioral Activation Tool for Depressed Patients

Behavioral Activation (BA) psychotherapy for depression typically applies paper-based activity planning and registration. This is cumbersome, subject to recall bias, and provides limited support for personalized reflection on individual activity patterns. This paper presents MORIBUS; a smartphone tool for BA to be used in therapy. It provides a simple way of planning and registering activities, and their immediate emotional impact. Through visual analytic tools, the patient gains personalized insight into own behavior. We examined the feasibility of MORIBUS in a 4-week study including seven patients diagnosed with depression. The study revealed individual differences in BA patterns. We discuss the implications of these findings and argue for the necessity of automatic but still personalized technology.