Stephanie Hepburn is a writer in New Orleans. She is the editor in chief of CrisisTalk. You can reach her at editor@crisisnow.com.
Reporting about mental health has often felt like swimming against the current — it’s a subject matter that affects us all and yet many turn away. I understand. Talking about mental health can be hard, though it doesn’t have to be, so I try to make the topic accessible and interesting.
Throughout my career, I have covered crime (my college paper beat), fashion, home decor, lifestyle, overall health and wellness, and human trafficking. I wrote these articles and books for large newspapers and publishers with a solid reach. I didn’t need to promote or share. I focused on the writing.
When I launched CrisisTalk in 2019, I had to not only find a way to reach my audience but also figure out how to get people outside the crisis mental health space to care. Speaking only within a silo isn’t great for furthering any public health messaging. That is no less true for mental health.
For close to seven years, I wrote about mental health crisis care systems, including policy gaps, system failures and the innovations helping bridge the chasms. CrisisTalk articles have been cited in newspapers and journals and by nonprofits and the federal government (and state and local ones too).
But I felt we needed broader reach. (I still do.) So, in December, I launched the CrisisTalk podcast. My hope has been to shift public perspective on mental health and substance use disorders, from viewing them as personal failures to understanding how, from a public health perspective, systemic problems in mental healthcare access affect us all.
Our first season focuses on the intersection of AI and mental health. Why AI? Well, people (adults and kids) are turning to Large Language Models to discuss their relationships and mental health concerns. Some are turning to them for friendship and companionship. But LLMs are changing so rapidly that researchers and the public are always behind on the effects and implications of turning to them.
To figure out what’s happening, the potential risks and gains of using AI in this way, I tested and interviewed the chatbots myself. (Ep. 5.) I’ve spoken to John Torous, one of the premier (if not the most premier) experts on this intersection, and researchers on many topics, including whether an AI chatbot or peer is better at mitigating loneliness or whether chatbots are worsening people’s OCD symptoms.
One of the most critical conversations I’ve had is with Laura Reiley, a journalist whose daughter Sophie died by suicide. After Sophie’s death, her best friend found her ChatGPT log.
As a mother and reporter, I braced myself for the interview. I was nervous. I rarely cry in interviews. Not because I’m callous, but because I don’t want to put my emotions on the person I’m interviewing who is sharing pieces of their innermost pain with me. I worried that while interviewing Laura, I would cry. That my heart would break for her loss and she would have to take time out of her pain to pay attention to mine. The thought horrified me.
During our conversation, Laura balanced openness and objectivity in such a profound way. The result is an interview not quite like one I’ve ever done before, nor heard. Perhaps that’s why this specific episode is a Signal Awards finalist.
Laura shares what regulators need to be thinking about: the issues of blanket prohibition, the rapid adoption of LLMs into daily life, sycophancy, anthropomorphization and how chatbots use language of personhood (“I care,” “me”). She shares bits of Sophie’s conversation with ChatGPT:
“Well, I even think that the claim of personhood is very problematic with all of these…In Sophie’s case, she told it she was going to kill herself, and it said, ‘Oh, Sophie, that must be so hard for you. You’re so brave for telling me.’ And it’s infuriating because she wasn’t brave at all for telling it. First of all, there’s no ‘me.’ It’s not a me. And second of all, she wasn’t brave. She was the opposite of brave. She was telling an AI [chatbot] because she couldn’t tell her parents or her therapist or her best friend. She was doing it. She was using it as a release valve so that she could keep her secret secret.”
I hope you have a listen. Here’s the direct voting link for CrisisTalk, if you want to support this episode for the Signal Listener’s Choice Award. Please vote and share. We appreciate your support, not only for CrisisTalk but for spreading mental health awareness.
Thank you,
Stephanie Hepburn
Host and Executive Producer
CrisisTalk
