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Background: Change and sustain talks (negative and positive comments) on gambling have been relevant for determining gamblers’ outcomes but they have not been used to clarify the abstinence process in anonymous gambler meetings. Objective: The aim of this study was to develop a change talk model for abstinence based on data extracted from web-based anonymous gambler chat meetings by using an automatic change talk classifier. Methods: This study used registry data from the internet. The author accessed web-based anonymous gambler chat meetings in Japan and sampled 1.63 million utterances (two-sentence texts) from 267 abstinent gamblers who have remained abstinent for at least three years and 1625 nonabstinent gamblers. The change talk classifier in this study automatically classified gamblers’ utterances into change and sustain talks. Results: Abstinent gamblers showed higher proportions of change talks and lower probability of sustain talks compared with nonabstinent gamblers. The change talk model for abstinence, involving change and sustain talks, classified abstinent and nonabstinent gamblers through the use of a support vector machine with a radial basis kernel function. The model also indicated individual evaluation scores for abstinence and the ideal proportion of change talks for all participants according to their previous utterances. Conclusions: Abstinence likelihood among gamblers can be increased by providing personalized evaluation values and indicating the optimal proportion of change talks. Moreover, this may help to prevent severe mental, social, and financial problems caused by the gambling disorder.

Nonverbal synchrony (NVS) of a patient’s and therapist’s body parts during a therapy session has been linked with therapeutic alliance. However, the link between NVS of face parts with therapeutic alliance remains unclear. The clarification of this link is important in understanding NVS. Accordingly, we used a video imaging technique to provide quantitative evidence of this link. The 55 participants in this study were the same as in a previous study. Both the participants' and the therapist's faces were video recorded during structured psychotherapeutic interviews. Our machine quantified 500,500 participants’ faces and 500,500 therapists’ faces from the perspectives of facial movements and expressions. Results show that absolute synchrony of happy and scared expressions were positively related to therapeutic alliance. However, symmetrical synchrony of left eye movements negatively predicted therapeutic alliance, although participants’ sex, age, volume of facial movements, and volume of facial expressions were controlled. Absolute synchrony of facial expressions was regarded as emotional interaction within 2 seconds delay, whereas symmetrical synchrony of left eye movements was regarded as a blocker of emotional interaction.

The links between gambling and criminal offenses have been frequently reported, but the pathways from gambling to a particular offense have not. Our study applied a pathways model to predict participants’ income-generating, drug-related, and violent offenses stemming from their craving for gambling. The participants were 332 male inmates in a Japanese local prison. They answered questionnaires on gambling behavior, alcohol addiction, Internet addiction, impulsivity, and psychopathy. Their official records with information on their current offense, sentence length, number of imprisonments, and length of education were also analyzed. The results show that 38.55% (n = 128) of the participants had a probable gambling disorder, a rate of problem gambling at least four times higher than that among the general Japanese population. Furthermore, their craving for gambling predicted their income-generating offenses, but not their drug-related and violent offenses. Their craving for gambling can thus be linked to their financial issues, rather than their emotional and impulsive issues. The pathways model explained the path not only from addiction/psychopathy to gambling, but also from gambling to committing an income-generating offense.

The use of Virtual Agents (VAs) is currently a popular topic in mental health interviews. Advantages of VA over Real Expert (RE) in the interview were reported. However, the advantages of audio-visual VAs over REs during comprehensive mental health interviews remain unclear, and their clarification is important to promote the practical application of VAs in these settings. To explore the advantages, we triangulated data using mixed methods design, aiming to show quantitative advantages of the VAs in their perceived rapport and eye movement, and to describe the qualitative advantages of the VAs in their disclosed mental symptoms during the interview. A total of 55 Japanese university students participated in comprehensive mental health interviews conducted by the VA and RE. Findings show that participants perceived rapport and moved their right eyes more often, along with disclosing numerous mental symptoms, with the RE than the VA. However, they disclosed more sex-related symptoms to the VA than the RE. The VA can be used most practically in sex-related health fields. The anonymity conditions in the VA setting might be relevant to patients’ self-disclosure of sex-related topics.

We validated the Japanese version of the Multidimensional Stress Questionnaire for Couples (MSQ, Multidimensionaler Stressfragebogen für Paare) and examined construct validity and reliability. We conducted an online longitudinal survey of 300 husbands and 300 wives in 2017. The Japanese version of the MSQ had a two-factor structure centered on internal and external stressors. The internal-stressor factor showed sufficient validity and reliability making it suitable for measuring marital stressors and the external-stressor factor also did show acceptable validity in both husbands and wives. The MSQ-J will be useful not only for the research but also for the clinical practice.

Social reintegration has been known to protect against recidivism, but its effects against drug-use relapse have previously remained unclear. To address this gap, the present study sampled 196 inmates imprisoned for drug-related offenses in Japan. We examined the protective effects of a social reintegration (parole) program against recidivism and drug-use relapse using a 4-year prospective design. During the 4-year follow up, 79 (40.3%) of the participants reoffended and 61 (31.1%) relapsed into drug use. The results suggest that the parole program was significantly associated with a decreased risk of recidivism, even if participants’ age, sentence length, number of prison terms, educational levels, and gang membership were controlled for. However, the effects of the parole program on drug relapse disappeared when the above variables were controlled for. To decrease the risk of relapse, drug-related inmates may need both prosocial communities and rehabilitative environments. The Japanese criminal justice system needs to introduce drug treatment courts for drug users.

People seek self-verification from others. Previous studies suggest that striving for self-verification (e.g., the disclosure of accurate self-information and the preservation of a sense of coherence about oneself in social relationships) functionalizes couple relationships in Western cultures. However, there has been little research on couples in Asian cultures. The aim of this study is to address this gap by examining 46 heterosexual Japanese couples. Attitudes and behaviors regarding striving for self-verification, stress communication, and trust in marital relationships were assessed using a questionnaire. In contrast to previous Western studies, Japanese couples striving for self-verification had a stronger association between the attitudes of wives regarding striving for self-verification and their own trust and stress communication than that of their husbands. The role of Asian wives is also discussed.