ALBA: Adaptive Language-based Assessments for Mental Health

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Varadarajan, Vasudha, Sikström, Sverker, Kjell, Oscar N. E., Schwartz, H. Andrew
Format: Preprint
Published: 2023
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author Varadarajan, Vasudha
Sikström, Sverker
Kjell, Oscar N. E.
Schwartz, H. Andrew
author_facet Varadarajan, Vasudha
Sikström, Sverker
Kjell, Oscar N. E.
Schwartz, H. Andrew
contents Mental health issues differ widely among individuals, with varied signs and symptoms. Recently, language-based assessments have shown promise in capturing this diversity, but they require a substantial sample of words per person for accuracy. This work introduces the task of Adaptive Language-Based Assessment ALBA, which involves adaptively ordering questions while also scoring an individual's latent psychological trait using limited language responses to previous questions. To this end, we develop adaptive testing methods under two psychometric measurement theories: Classical Test Theory and Item Response Theory. We empirically evaluate ordering and scoring strategies, organizing into two new methods: a semi-supervised item response theory-based method ALIRT and a supervised Actor-Critic model. While we found both methods to improve over non-adaptive baselines, We found ALIRT to be the most accurate and scalable, achieving the highest accuracy with fewer questions (e.g., Pearson r ~ 0.93 after only 3 questions as compared to typically needing at least 7 questions). In general, adaptive language-based assessments of depression and anxiety were able to utilize a smaller sample of language without compromising validity or large computational costs.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2311_06467
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle ALBA: Adaptive Language-based Assessments for Mental Health
Varadarajan, Vasudha
Sikström, Sverker
Kjell, Oscar N. E.
Schwartz, H. Andrew
Computation and Language
Artificial Intelligence
Mental health issues differ widely among individuals, with varied signs and symptoms. Recently, language-based assessments have shown promise in capturing this diversity, but they require a substantial sample of words per person for accuracy. This work introduces the task of Adaptive Language-Based Assessment ALBA, which involves adaptively ordering questions while also scoring an individual's latent psychological trait using limited language responses to previous questions. To this end, we develop adaptive testing methods under two psychometric measurement theories: Classical Test Theory and Item Response Theory. We empirically evaluate ordering and scoring strategies, organizing into two new methods: a semi-supervised item response theory-based method ALIRT and a supervised Actor-Critic model. While we found both methods to improve over non-adaptive baselines, We found ALIRT to be the most accurate and scalable, achieving the highest accuracy with fewer questions (e.g., Pearson r ~ 0.93 after only 3 questions as compared to typically needing at least 7 questions). In general, adaptive language-based assessments of depression and anxiety were able to utilize a smaller sample of language without compromising validity or large computational costs.
title ALBA: Adaptive Language-based Assessments for Mental Health
topic Computation and Language
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2311.06467