THERAPY 2.0 – eCounselling and Therapeutic Interactions with Digital Natives

Up to now most activities concerning counselling and therapy with ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) have been limited to applications of personal computers for emails and internet tools. Counsellors and therapists still rely almost exclusively on traditional interaction with their clients (“the couch”). Due to this, especially the younger generation and “digital natives” may not be reached to the full extent, as they have a fundamentally different communication behaviour. The goal of the Therapy 2.0 project is not only to raise awareness of the potentials of ICT based approaches in therapeutic and counselling processes, but also to provide a practical guide to the different ways of how technology can be used, best practice examples, and a mobile application for smartphones. The project is developed by a multi-disciplinary team of mental health and social counselling organisations, education and pedagogic expert partners as well as ICT and multimedia specialists under Erasmus+ program. The most important outputs of the project are: Therapy 2.0 Guidelines enable social, pedagogic and psychologic counsellors, advisers and therapists to deliver counselling or therapy services via technology. Therapy 2.0 Toolbox as a complement to the Guidelines offers a modular range of awareness raising, training and demonstration materials. The Therapy 2.0 e- platform supports the delivery of all material of the project and support online interactive tools. Therapy2.0 mobile application provides greater validity since data are collected in the clients’ natural environment. The program is launched ( https://www.ecounselling4youth.eu/toolbox/main/ toolbox.php) and will be demonstrated and discussed.