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BackgroundConsidering the huge population in China, the available mental health resources are inadequate. Thus, our study aimed to evaluate whether mental questionnaires, serving as auxiliary diagnostic tools, have efficient diagnostic ability in outpatient psychiatric services.MethodsWe conducted a retrospective study of Chinese psychiatric outpatients. Altogether 1,182, 5,069, and 4,958 records of Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90), Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A), and Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D), respectively, were collected from March 2021 to July 2022. The Mann–Whitney U test was applied to subscale scores and total scores of SCL-90, HAM-A, and HAM-D between the two sexes (male and female groups), different age groups, and four diagnostic groups (anxiety disorder, depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia). Kendall's tau coefficient analysis and machine learning were also conducted in the diagnostic groups.ResultsWe found significant differences in most subscale scores for both age and gender groups. Using the Mann–Whitney U test and Kendall's tau coefficient analysis, we found that there were no statistically significant differences in diseases in total scale scores and nearly all subscale scores. The results of machine learning (ML) showed that for HAM-A, anxiety had a small degree of differentiation with an AUC of 0.56, while other diseases had an AUC close to 0.50. As for HAM-D, bipolar disorder was slightly distinguishable with an AUC of 0.60, while the AUC of other diseases was lower than 0.50. In SCL-90, all diseases had a similar AUC; among them, bipolar disorder had the lowest score, schizophrenia had the highest score, while anxiety and depression both had an AUC of approximately 0.56.ConclusionThis study is the first to conduct wide and comprehensive analyses on the use of these three scales in Chinese outpatient clinics with both traditional statistical approaches and novel machine learning methods. Our results indicated that the univariate subscale scores did not have statistical significance among our four diagnostic groups, which highlights the limit of their practical use by doctors in identifying different mental diseases in Chinese outpatient psychiatric services.

Objective: Side effects in the psychotherapy are sometimes unavoidable. Therapists play a significant role in the side effects of psychotherapy, but there have been few quantitative studies on the mechanisms by which therapists contribute to them. Methods: We designed the psychotherapy Side Effects Questionnaire-Therapist Version (PSEQ-T) and released it online through an official WeChat account, where 530 therapists participated in the cross-sectional analysis. The therapists were classified into groups with and without perceptions of clients’ side effects. A number of features were selected to distinguish the therapists by category. Six machine learning-based algorithms were selected and trained by our dataset to build classification models. We leveraged the Shapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) method to quantify the importance of each feature to the therapist categories. Results: Our study demonstrated the following: (1) Of the therapists, 316 perceived clients’ side effects in psychotherapy, with a 59.6% incidence of side effects; the most common type was “make the clients or patients feel bad” (49.8%). (2) A Random Forest-based machine-learning classifier offered the best predictive performance to distinguish the therapists with and without perceptions of clients' side effects, with an F1 score of 0.722 and an AUC value of 0.717. (3) “Therapists’ psychological activity” was the most relevant feature for distinguishing the therapist category. Conclusions: Our study revealed that the therapist's mastery of the limitations of psychotherapy technology and theory, especially the awareness and construction of their psychological states, was the most critical factor in predicting the therapist's perception of the side effects of psychotherapy.

BackgroundDespite the number of empirical studies identifying the helpful factors correlated with beneficial psychotherapy outcomes, there is no validated scale that measures helpful therapeutic attitudes and interventions applied by therapists within the actual therapy process in China. In the current study, we developed the Helpful Therapeutic Attitudes and Interventions Scale (HTAIS) as an accessible client-rated instrument to measure useful interventions applied by the therapist during psychotherapy sessions.Materials and methodsBased on the results of previous literature and our prior psychotherapy process studies, a 40-item measure was initially designed. Two studies with a total of 2,780 Chinese participants who received psychotherapy were carried out to evaluate the structure, reliability, and validity of the developed scale.ResultsPrincipal component analysis yielded a three-component HTAIS containing 26 items. The scale included dimensions labeled “Empathy, respect and neutrality,” “Using techniques to solve practical issues,” and “In-depth exploration and expansion.” Confirmatory factor analysis showed the construct validity of the derived three components model. And the developed scale had high internal consistency and test-retest reliability. The scale scores of the HTAIS were positively correlated with those of the Working Alliance Scale and Session Rating Scale, as well as clients’ perceived therapy satisfaction, thus supporting its concurrent validity.ConclusionThe HTAIS allows an immediate examination, as experienced by the client, of the extent to which certain useful therapeutics interventions have been conducted during therapy and could help to improve the clinician’s subsequent therapy strategies. Future research is suggested to further validate the scale, especially to assess its psychometric properties in various populations with different clinical complaints.

Abstract Metabolic syndrome (MetS) is associated with depression, but its role in major depressive disorder comorbid with anxiety (AMD) is unclear. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and clinical correlates of MetS in first-episode drug-naive (FEDN) patients with AMD in a Chinese Han population. In total, 1380 FEDN outpatients with AMD were recruited in this cross-sectional study. The sociodemographic features, clinical characteristics, history of suicide attempts, thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) levels, and MetS parameters of each subject were evaluated. All subjects were rated on the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D), Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A), and the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale positive symptom subscale. The prevalence of MetS among AMD patients was 8.04%. Compared to the non-MetS group, age, age of onset, TSH level, HAM-A and HAM-D scores, history of attempted suicide, and comorbid psychiatric symptoms were higher in the MetS group. Those in this group were also more likely to be married, and they had a lower educational level. Furthermore, age, psychiatric symptoms, suicide attempts, and higher TSH levels were independently associated with MetS in AMD patients. This study suggests a lower prevalence of MetS in FEDN patients with AMD in a Chinese Han population. Older age, comorbid psychiatric symptoms, history of attempted suicide, and higher TSH levels are related factors for MetS in AMD patients.

The two-child policy has been implemented in China since 2016 and has attracted the attention of the world. Adolescents may face huge psychological challenges in the process of changing family structures and relationships. To date, no mental health survey of adolescents from two-child families has been conducted. We investigated the prevalence and risk factors for childhood trauma, anxiety, and depression in two-child families in a statistically representative sample of Chinese senior high school students from Shanghai. A total of 426 participants were randomly selected from 1,059 students of four senior high schools in different districts of Shanghai. The childhood trauma questionnaire-short form (CTQ-SF), self-rating anxiety scale (SAS) and self-rating depression scale (SDS) were used as the screening tools. We found that the overall prevalence of childhood trauma, anxiety, and depression among senior high school students in two-child families was 46.70% (95% CI, 39.93–53.47%), 22.17% (95% CI, 16.53–27.81%), and 35.85% (95% CI, 29.34–42.36%), respectively. The two-child families was an important factor associated childhood trauma, emotional neglect, and physical neglect (χ2 = 5.984, p = 0.014; χ2 = 4.071, p = 0.044; χ2 = 4.202, p = 0.040). Ranking in two-child families was a risk factor for childhood trauma (β = −0.135, p = 0.048). Parental preference was a significantly correlated with physical abuse, physical neglect, anxiety, and depression (β = −1.581 to 0.088, p < 0.05). Meanwhile, emotional abuse, physical abuse, emotional neglect, and physical neglect of participants in the two groups were positively correlated with anxiety and depression (r = 0.195–0.478, p < 0.05). There was a significant relationship between sexual abuse and anxiety symptoms in the one-child family group (r = 0.161, p < 0.05). The findings suggest that the overall prevalence of childhood trauma, anxiety and depression among adolescents from two-child families in China was high. The two-child families and family ranking are important factors associated childhood trauma, while parental preference is related to anxiety and depression. These results highlight an urgent need to be addressed by adolescents' mental health service providers and policy-makers.

The COVID-19 vaccine has been administered to over 200 countries and regions. With the unprecedented vaccination scale and speed, vaccination correlated mental health issues should be paid precise attention to. This study aims to assess the association between socio-demographic factors and mental health following vaccination and to analyze the mediation effect of vaccine hesitancy. This study recruited 2112 individuals who took two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine in Shanghai. Structural equation modeling was performed to assess factors associated with anxiety and depression of the vaccinated individuals and the underlying mechanism. The results yielded that vaccine hesitancy partially mediated/suppressed the effect from gender and employment status to anxiety/depression and fully mediated the effects from education to anxiety/depression. This study advanced the understanding of mental health disparity among different socio-demographic groups after vaccination and the impact of vaccine hesitancy on the vaccinated population’s mental health. The finding offered insights into the possible mental vulnerability of people holding a hesitant attitude before vaccination and suggested that vaccine hesitancy played a crucial role in people’s mental health after vaccination. Health promotion programs can target vaccine hesitancy to prevent unfavorable mental health consequences among specific populations.

Background: Side effects in psychotherapy are a common phenomenon, but due to insufficient understanding of the relevant predictors of side effects in psychotherapy, many psychotherapists or clinicians fail to identify and manage these side effects. The purpose of this study was to predict whether clients or patients would experience side effects in psychotherapy by machine learning and to analyze the related influencing factors.Methods: A self-compiled “Psychotherapy Side Effects Questionnaire (PSEQ)” was delivered online by a WeChat official account. Three hundred and seventy participants were included in the cross-sectional analysis. Psychotherapy outcomes were classified as participants with side effects and without side effects. A number of features were selected to distinguish participants with different psychotherapy outcomes. Six machine learning-based algorithms were then chosen and trained by our dataset to build outcome prediction classifiers.Results: Our study showed that: (1) the most common side effects were negative emotions in psychotherapy, such as anxiety, tension, sadness, and anger, etc. (24.6%, 91/370); (2) the mental state of the psychotherapist, as perceived by the participant during psychotherapy, was the most relevant feature to predict whether clients would experience side effects in psychotherapy; (3) a Random Forest-based machine learning classifier offered the best prediction performance of the psychotherapy outcomes, with an F1-score of 0.797 and an AUC value of 0.804. These numbers indicate a high prediction performance, which allowed our approach to be used in practice.Conclusions: Our Random Forest-based machine learning classifier could accurately predict the possible outcome of a client in psychotherapy. Our study sheds light on the influencing factors of the side effects of psychotherapy and could help psychotherapists better predict the outcomes of psychotherapy.

This study examined the impact of family function and family-related factors, such as being an only child, grandparenting, income, and family relationship on the self-esteem in college students who are in the transitional period from late adolescence to emerging adulthood. The participants were 2001 Chinese college freshmen with the age from 16 to 20 years. Data were collected by using the family assessment device (FAD), the Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale, and self-report of family information. Comparison analysis indicated that the students from one child families, harmonious families, from families with higher income, or raised by their parents without the experience of grandparenting are more likely to show high self-esteem than their counterparts. Moreover, a multiple regression showed that dimensions of FAD such as role, communication, behavioral control, and problem solving predicted level of self-esteem of the college students, ranging from 13.2 to 17.9% variance. The results of this study showed that the self-esteem of the college freshmen is highly correlated with their family’s performance. Therefore, the program focusing on improving family functioning is needed, in order to enhance the self-esteem of the young people and hence contribute to promoting the mental health of them.

Given the difficulty of treating schizophrenia and other forms of psychosis, researchers have shifted focus to early detection and intervention of individuals at clinical high risk (CHR) for psychosis. Previous studies have shown that elements in family functioning could predict symptom outcome in CHR individuals. However, associations between self reported family functioning and symptom or functioning outcome of CHR individuals was rarely reported. Our study aimed to investigate the characteristics and the role of family functioning in the development of CHR individuals among young adolescents.A sample of 32 CHR individuals was recruited from 2800 university students. The characteristics of family perception were evaluated by both Family Assessment Device (FAD) and Family cohesion and adaptability evaluation Scale II (FACES II). 6 month follow up data was available with 25 of the recruited CHR individuals. Baseline socio-demographic characteristics and family functioning were compared between CHR and control group. We also measured the associations between different dimensions of perceived family functioning and both severity of prodromal symptoms and global functioning at baseline and 6-month follow up.CHR individuals showed more maladaptive family functioning compared to control in nearly all of the dimensions of FAD and FACES II except for Affective Involvement. Better Problem Solving and Affective Responsiveness predicted less severe positive and negative symptoms respectively. Family cohesion and adaptability were not only correlated with the baseline severity of general symptoms, but also positively associated with the general and disorganized symptom outcome.This study contributed preliminary evidence towards the associations between family perception and symptom outcome of CHR individuals. It also provided evidence for the importance of family interventions on CHR individuals.

Background: This study aimed to explore the characteristics of event-related potentials induced by facial emotion recognition in patients with first-episode schizophrenia and in their siblings. Methods: In this case-control study, 30 first-episode schizophrenia patients, 26 siblings, and 30 healthy controls were enrolled. They completed facial emotion recognition tasks from the Ekman Standard Faces Database as an induction for evoked potentials. Evoked potential data were obtained using a 64-channel electroencephalography system. Average evoked potential waveforms were computed from epochs for each stimulus type. The amplitudes and latency of the event-related potentials for P100 (positive potential 100 ms after stimulus onset), N170 (negative potential 170 ms after stimulus onset), and N250 (fronto-central peak) were investigated at O1, O2, P7, and P8 electrode locations. Results: There were significant differences between the groups for P100 amplitude (F = 11.526, P < 0.001), electrode position (F = 450.592, P < 0.001), emotion (disgust vs. happiness vs. fear) (F = 1722.467, P < 0.001), and emotion intensity (low vs. moderate vs. high) (F = 1737.169, P < 0.001). Post hoc analysis showed significantly larger amplitudes in the schizophrenia group at the O1, O2, P7, and P8 electrode positions. There were no significant differences between the siblings of schizophrenia patients and the healthy controls. Conclusions: Patients with schizophrenia showed abnormalities in P100 amplitude, but similar results were not observed in their siblings. These results provide evidence of dysfunctional event-related potential patterns underlying facial emotion processing in patients with schizophrenia. P100 may be a characteristic index of schizophrenia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Although many studies have examined executive functions and facial emotion recognition in people with schizophrenia, few of them focused on the correlation between them. Furthermore, their relationship in the siblings of patients also remains unclear. The aim of the present study is to examine the correlation between executive functions and facial emotion recognition in patients with first-episode schizophrenia and their siblings. Methods: Thirty patients with first-episode schizophrenia, their twenty-six siblings, and thirty healthy controls were enrolled. They completed facial emotion recognition tasks using the Ekman Standard Faces Database, and executive functioning was measured by Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST). Hierarchical regression analysis was applied to assess the correlation between executive functions and facial emotion recognition. Results: Our study found that in siblings, the accuracy in recognizing low degree 'disgust' emotion was negatively correlated with the total correct rate in WCST (r = -0.614, p = 0.023), but was positively correlated with the total error in WCST (r = 0.623, p = 0.020); the accuracy in recognizing 'neutral' emotion was positively correlated with the total error rate in WCST (r = 0.683, p = 0.014) while negatively correlated with the total correct rate in WCST (r = -0.677, p = 0.017). People with schizophrenia showed an impairment in facial emotion recognition when identifying moderate 'happy' facial emotion, the accuracy of which was significantly correlated with the number of completed categories of WCST (R2 = 0.432, P < .05). There were no correlations between executive functions and facial emotion recognition in the healthy control group. Conclusions: Our study demonstrated that facial emotion recognition impairment correlated with executive function impairment in people with schizophrenia and their unaffected siblings but not in healthy controls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]